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This is probably common knowledge to Americans, but I noticed that the latest amendment on the commit log was written by James Madison. I was confused as to ho

This is probably common knowledge to Americans, but I noticed that the latest amendment on the commit log was written by James Madison. I was confused as to how that came about so recently and found on the wikipedia page: >It was submitted by the 1st Congress to the states for ratification on September 25, 1789, along with eleven other proposed amendments. While ten of these twelve proposals were ratified in 1791 to become the Bill of Rights, what would become the Twenty-seventh Amendment and the proposed Congressional Apportionment Amendment did not get ratified by enough states for them to also come into force with the first ten amendments. > The proposed congressional pay amendment was largely forgotten until 1982, when Gregory Watson, a 19-year-old sophomore at the University of Texas at Austin, wrote a paper for a government class in which he claimed that the amendment could still be ratified. A teaching assistant graded the paper a "C" and an appeal to the professor, Sharon Waite, failed, motivating Watson to launch a nationwide campaign to complete its ratification.[1] The amendment eventually became part of the United States Constitution, effective May 5, 1992,[2] completing a record-setting ratification period of 202 years, 7 months, and 10 days

lisper 7y ago
Not common knowledge at all. I learned about it back in the 1970s on a school field trip to Washington DC. I was looking at the original Bill of Rights in the National Archives and realized there were twelve amendments there rather than ten. I pointed this out to my teacher who told me to be quiet. (I think I was 10 years old at the time, so I complied.)
- bskap 7y ago
  It's probably more commonly known among people who have taken government classes since 1992, since it's basically proof that government classes can have a real impact on public policy.
  - dolessdrugs 7y ago
    nope I took US history multiple times after that, still thought the bill of rights had 10 amendments
    - devnulloverflow 7y ago
      As far as I know, "bill of rights" is in fact the informal name of the first 10 amendments -- which were proposed and passed as part of the political compromise that got the constitution accepted at all. The remaining amendments are, well, just amendments. They don't necessarily specify rights, and are generally not considered part of the bill of rights.
frandroid 7y ago
Did his grade eventually get upgraded to A, or was the paper just badly written in spite of this great insight?
- IIAOPSW 7y ago
  The appeal went all the way up to the supreme court. In a controversial 5-4 decision he was awarded a B-.
  - Aperocky 7y ago
    B- level shitpost.
- Miner49er 7y ago
  Yep! Wikipedia says it was changed in 2017. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twenty-seventh_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution#Revival_of_interest https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twenty-seventh_Amendment_to_th...
  - dheelus 7y ago
    Yep, I was at the popup theatre event where the teacher showed up and upgraded his grade!
    - test6554 7y ago
      Did the teacher also admit to being a cunt?
celticninja 7y ago
Did he appeal his grade after that?
- justin66 7y ago
  https://www.statesman.com/news/20170314/herman-35-years-later-a-for-austinite-who-got-constitution-amended https://www.statesman.com/news/20170314/herman-35-years-late...
- piptastic 7y ago
  And with the benefit of hindsight, Waite says, Watson clearly doesn't deserve that C she gave him. "Goodness, he certainly proved he knew how to work the Constitution and what it meant and how to be politically active," she says. "So, yes, I think he deserves an A after that effort — A-plus!" And that's exactly what happened. On March 1, Waite signed a form to officially change Watson's grade. Thirty-five years after Gregory Watson wrote his paper, he finally got his C changed to an A. https://www.npr.org/2017/05/05/526900818/the-bad-grade-that-changed-the-u-s-constitution https://www.npr.org/2017/05/05/526900818/the-bad-grade-that-...
  - jldugger 7y ago
    Note well, would-be faculty: this is the degree to which undergrads will hound you if you grade homework accurately.
    - ska 7y ago
      At least in this case, it wasn't a parent.
  - Rebelgecko 7y ago
    Did that end up retroactively changing his grade in the course as well?
    - patmorgan23 7y ago
      Yes, grade changes are done on the course level. The registrar doesn't keep track of the individual assignments.
breck 7y ago
> This is probably common knowledge to Americans I for one never heard of this, so thanks for sharing!
jekor93n 7y ago
Pretty interesting huh? The qualified expert said no way. A public citizen said yes way and pushed on the government to make it happen. Back to ignoring the idea so I can push up the stock price.
koboll 7y ago
>When Watson began his campaign in early 1982, he was aware of ratification by only six states and he erroneously believed that Virginia's 1791 approval was the last action taken by the states. He discovered in 1983 that Ohio had approved it in 1873 as a means of protest against the Salary Grab Act and learned in 1984 that Wyoming had done the same 6 years earlier in 1978, as a protest against a 1977 congressional pay raise. Further, Watson did not know, until 1997, well after the amendment's adoption, that Kentucky had ratified the amendment in 1792. Neither did Kentucky lawmakers themselves — in Watson's desire for a 50-state sweep, the Kentucky General Assembly post-ratified the amendment in 1996 (Senate Joint Resolution No. 50), at Watson's request, likewise unaware that the task had already been attended to some 204 years earlier. >In 2016, Zach Elkins, a professor in the UT Department of Government, became interested in Watson's story and began to document its origins. He tracked down Sharon Waite, who had left academia in the 1980s to work on her family's citrus farm. Elkins suggested to Waite that they change Watson's grade. In 2017, Elkins submitted a grade change form with Waite's signature and a grade change to "A+". In an interview with NPR, Waite stated, "Goodness, he certainly proved he knew how to work the Constitution and what it meant and how to be politically active, [...] So, yes, I think he deserves an A after that effort — A-plus!" The registrar approved a grade change to "A", because the university does not give grades higher than "A". How has this not yet been made into a comedy?
- theturtletalks 7y ago
  I’ve never been more proud of my alma mater.
- nojvek 7y ago
  Would love to see this as a movie. Or at-least a book
- shadowoflight 7y ago
  >The registrar approved a grade change to "A", because the university does not give grades higher than "A". It’s hilarious to me that the bureaucracy of this university couldn’t allow even a single grade above an A in this exceptional circumstance - I wonder if it actually came down to some hard limit in their grade keeping system, or if some grumpy recordskeeper just said, “Nope, this is how we’ve always done things, so this is how we will always do things.”
deep_merge 7y ago
More Perfect, a podcast by one of the hosts of Radiolab, has an episode on this in song form: https://project.wnyc.org/themostperfectalbum/#amendment-27 https://project.wnyc.org/themostperfectalbum/#amendment-27 Side note: This podcast is excellent. The first two seasons are not songs, but investigative (and entertaining!) pieces on important Supreme Court rulings.
jupp0r 7y ago
Yeah that should definitely be part of the commit message!
js2 7y ago
Submitted to HN last year: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17947726 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17947726
mikorym 7y ago
This is pretty funny. I had something vaguely similar happen to me, although not nearly as major. In my matric year (grade 12) I took three first languages (although I already had two first languages by grade 10). The department of education did not like it, but I did it anyway, with some encouragement from my language teachers. Fast forward to the final exams, I did well enough to make the provincial top 40, but was excluded due to what I still think was a bug in their system. Funnily enough, I walked to the provincial minister for education (later the national Minister of Health) and told him what happened. For a short while I was a radio celebrity due to the minister personally telling people "Look, this white boy got a B in Sepedi so you guys really should stop complaining and do better." [1] The error was not corrected and I was actually at the ceremony by chance for having gotten best in English in the province. I also randomly got a call from some trust and got about $100 for my creative writing essay. In any case I guess the whole radio thing was more amusing to me and actually was a better prize in the end. [1] In South Africa, a B is 70%—79%; I had gotten 76%.
naniwaduni 7y ago
Yep, this is why git has separate author and commit dates.
CobrastanJorji 7y ago
Of note, there is another amendment in a somewhat similar position, the Equal Rights Amendment: “Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.” It's one state shy of passing and has been that way since the '80s. That said, there's a very strong argument that the amendment is no longer eligible to be passed because, unlike Madison's amendment, there was an explicit "this offer expires" date in the bill passed by Congress, and that date has long passed. Also, several states rescinded their ratifications. That said, there are plausible legal theories that states aren't actually allowed to un-ratify amendments and that proposed amendments can't expire.

lisper 7y ago

Not common knowledge at all. I learned about it back in the 1970s on a school field trip to Washington DC. I was looking at the original Bill of Rights in the National Archives and realized there were twelve amendments there rather than ten. I pointed this out to my teacher who told me to be quiet. (I think I was 10 years old at the time, so I complied.)

bskap 7y ago
It's probably more commonly known among people who have taken government classes since 1992, since it's basically proof that government classes can have a real impact on public policy.
- dolessdrugs 7y ago
  nope I took US history multiple times after that, still thought the bill of rights had 10 amendments
  - devnulloverflow 7y ago
    As far as I know, "bill of rights" is in fact the informal name of the first 10 amendments -- which were proposed and passed as part of the political compromise that got the constitution accepted at all. The remaining amendments are, well, just amendments. They don't necessarily specify rights, and are generally not considered part of the bill of rights.

frandroid 7y ago

Did his grade eventually get upgraded to A, or was the paper just badly written in spite of this great insight?

IIAOPSW 7y ago
The appeal went all the way up to the supreme court. In a controversial 5-4 decision he was awarded a B-.
- Aperocky 7y ago
  B- level shitpost.
Miner49er 7y ago
Yep! Wikipedia says it was changed in 2017. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twenty-seventh_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution#Revival_of_interest https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twenty-seventh_Amendment_to_th...
- dheelus 7y ago
  Yep, I was at the popup theatre event where the teacher showed up and upgraded his grade!
  - test6554 7y ago
    Did the teacher also admit to being a cunt?

celticninja 7y ago

Did he appeal his grade after that?

justin66 7y ago
https://www.statesman.com/news/20170314/herman-35-years-later-a-for-austinite-who-got-constitution-amended https://www.statesman.com/news/20170314/herman-35-years-late...
piptastic 7y ago
And with the benefit of hindsight, Waite says, Watson clearly doesn't deserve that C she gave him. "Goodness, he certainly proved he knew how to work the Constitution and what it meant and how to be politically active," she says. "So, yes, I think he deserves an A after that effort — A-plus!" And that's exactly what happened. On March 1, Waite signed a form to officially change Watson's grade. Thirty-five years after Gregory Watson wrote his paper, he finally got his C changed to an A. https://www.npr.org/2017/05/05/526900818/the-bad-grade-that-changed-the-u-s-constitution https://www.npr.org/2017/05/05/526900818/the-bad-grade-that-...
- jldugger 7y ago
  Note well, would-be faculty: this is the degree to which undergrads will hound you if you grade homework accurately.
  - ska 7y ago
    At least in this case, it wasn't a parent.
- Rebelgecko 7y ago
  Did that end up retroactively changing his grade in the course as well?
  - patmorgan23 7y ago
    Yes, grade changes are done on the course level. The registrar doesn't keep track of the individual assignments.

breck 7y ago

> This is probably common knowledge to Americans I for one never heard of this, so thanks for sharing!

jekor93n 7y ago

Pretty interesting huh? The qualified expert said no way. A public citizen said yes way and pushed on the government to make it happen. Back to ignoring the idea so I can push up the stock price.

koboll 7y ago

>When Watson began his campaign in early 1982, he was aware of ratification by only six states and he erroneously believed that Virginia's 1791 approval was the last action taken by the states. He discovered in 1983 that Ohio had approved it in 1873 as a means of protest against the Salary Grab Act and learned in 1984 that Wyoming had done the same 6 years earlier in 1978, as a protest against a 1977 congressional pay raise. Further, Watson did not know, until 1997, well after the amendment's adoption, that Kentucky had ratified the amendment in 1792. Neither did Kentucky lawmakers themselves — in Watson's desire for a 50-state sweep, the Kentucky General Assembly post-ratified the amendment in 1996 (Senate Joint Resolution No. 50), at Watson's request, likewise unaware that the task had already been attended to some 204 years earlier. >In 2016, Zach Elkins, a professor in the UT Department of Government, became interested in Watson's story and began to document its origins. He tracked down Sharon Waite, who had left academia in the 1980s to work on her family's citrus farm. Elkins suggested to Waite that they change Watson's grade. In 2017, Elkins submitted a grade change form with Waite's signature and a grade change to "A+". In an interview with NPR, Waite stated, "Goodness, he certainly proved he knew how to work the Constitution and what it meant and how to be politically active, [...] So, yes, I think he deserves an A after that effort — A-plus!" The registrar approved a grade change to "A", because the university does not give grades higher than "A". How has this not yet been made into a comedy?

theturtletalks 7y ago
I’ve never been more proud of my alma mater.
nojvek 7y ago
Would love to see this as a movie. Or at-least a book
shadowoflight 7y ago
>The registrar approved a grade change to "A", because the university does not give grades higher than "A". It’s hilarious to me that the bureaucracy of this university couldn’t allow even a single grade above an A in this exceptional circumstance - I wonder if it actually came down to some hard limit in their grade keeping system, or if some grumpy recordskeeper just said, “Nope, this is how we’ve always done things, so this is how we will always do things.”

deep_merge 7y ago

More Perfect, a podcast by one of the hosts of Radiolab, has an episode on this in song form: https://project.wnyc.org/themostperfectalbum/#amendment-27 https://project.wnyc.org/themostperfectalbum/#amendment-27 Side note: This podcast is excellent. The first two seasons are not songs, but investigative (and entertaining!) pieces on important Supreme Court rulings.

jupp0r 7y ago

Yeah that should definitely be part of the commit message!

js2 7y ago

Submitted to HN last year: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17947726 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17947726

mikorym 7y ago

This is pretty funny. I had something vaguely similar happen to me, although not nearly as major. In my matric year (grade 12) I took three first languages (although I already had two first languages by grade 10). The department of education did not like it, but I did it anyway, with some encouragement from my language teachers. Fast forward to the final exams, I did well enough to make the provincial top 40, but was excluded due to what I still think was a bug in their system. Funnily enough, I walked to the provincial minister for education (later the national Minister of Health) and told him what happened. For a short while I was a radio celebrity due to the minister personally telling people "Look, this white boy got a B in Sepedi so you guys really should stop complaining and do better." [1] The error was not corrected and I was actually at the ceremony by chance for having gotten best in English in the province. I also randomly got a call from some trust and got about $100 for my creative writing essay. In any case I guess the whole radio thing was more amusing to me and actually was a better prize in the end. [1] In South Africa, a B is 70%—79%; I had gotten 76%.

naniwaduni 7y ago

Yep, this is why git has separate author and commit dates.

CobrastanJorji 7y ago

Of note, there is another amendment in a somewhat similar position, the Equal Rights Amendment: “Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.” It's one state shy of passing and has been that way since the '80s. That said, there's a very strong argument that the amendment is no longer eligible to be passed because, unlike Madison's amendment, there was an explicit "this offer expires" date in the bill passed by Congress, and that date has long passed. Also, several states rescinded their ratifications. That said, there are plausible legal theories that states aren't actually allowed to un-ratify amendments and that proposed amendments can't expire.