8 ms·

When Americans Abandon the Constitution

17 points by clouddrover 3y ago

simonblack 3y ago
"The Constitution is just a piece of paper." - GW Bush Whether he actually said that, or merely behaved accordingly is really irrelevant. The Constitution has been shredded for the last quarter of a century. But political parties and most people just don't care about that. The US is in a death-spiral. Look around you. Is this the way things were back in 2000?
- toomuchtodo 3y ago
  https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/03/10/the-polarization-in-todays-congress-has-roots-that-go-back-decades/ https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/03/10/the-polar... https://www.axios.com/2017/12/15/how-american-politics-went-batshit-crazy-starting-with-newt-gingrich-1513306860 https://www.axios.com/2017/12/15/how-american-politics-went-... https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2016/07/how-american-politics-went-insane/485570/ https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2016/07/how-ame...
- anon373839 3y ago
  > The US is in a death-spiral. Look around you. Is this the way things were back in 2000? I think society was more cohesive in 2000. Multiculturalism, globalism, and technological changes (example: the filter bubble) have eroded cohesion not only in the US, but also in other populous, ethnically diverse societies. Yet, I think this “death spiral” take is a touch dramatic. Our short history is lined with one constitutional crisis after another.
wfurney 3y ago
https://archive.ph/SkKbm https://archive.ph/SkKbm
- dismalpedigree 3y ago
  This is continuously presenting me with a captcha in a loop. :(
  - wfurney 3y ago
    Works for me on a dedicated IP. They were down the other day so maybe some residual issues. Try here https://web.archive.org/web/20230915001212/https://www.theatlantic.com/newsletters/archive/2023/09/mitt-romney-retirement-senate-constitution/675327/ https://web.archive.org/web/20230915001212/https://www.theat...
  - defrost 3y ago
    You're most likely working with Cloudflare DNS which doesn't play nice with archive.{xxx} (or vice versa). Flushing and switching to Google | Quad9 | AdBlock DNS might fix that for you.
  - o11c 3y ago
    Pretty sure it does that for everybody in the modern IPv6 world.
OfSanguineFire 3y ago
Surprised to see this article makes a case only about the Republican Party's loss of interest in the Constitution. I personally know more Americans on the opposite end of the political spectrum and have heard the Constitution called illegitimate due to absence of input from BIPOC at its creation, or that the First Amendment is harmful because it does not curtail hate speech. The Second Amendment in the age of more powerful weapons than existed in 1787, is a popular subject of debate at this and similar sites. Thus, there seem to be a broad array of Americans who no longer feel invested in the guiding document of their polity, which might augur tumultuous times as factions strive towards some new foundation for a country.
- pauldenton 3y ago
  It's surprising people haven't lost more faith in the Constitution given the last 3 and a half years since March of 2020 People didn't realize that things like Freedom of Assembly had a political check, where protesting lockdowns is killing grandma but protesting the police is stunning and brave.
- rayiner 3y ago
  [flagged]
  - jeezfrk 3y ago
    [flagged]
- paulddraper 3y ago
  > surprising Can't be surprised if it's from The Atlantic :/
- wildermuthn 3y ago
  I agree that disavowal of the Constitution isn’t restricted to one party, but would go further: the Constitution isn’t really intended for “the people” at large. It’s intended for the set of people who would rise to power in its absence — call them the ruling classes. It’s an agreement between the powerful that this is how we get along, this is how we share and restrict power, this is how we maintain a government that avoids the descent into tyranny or dissolution. It may be that the Constitution is no longer a viable means of ensuring the peaceful transfer of power and of facilitating good-enough governance. It certainly has failed dramatically in the past to prevent civil strife. Is there an amendment that can fix whatever is wrong with the current situation and bring the elites back to the same page? What is wrong with the current situation? The fundamental problem is that the USA now thinks of itself as a direct democracy rather than a representative democracy and that modern technology has fueled the worst populist instincts of our population, creating an atmosphere ripe for demagoguery and factionalism. The Constitution had a solution for this — the indirect representation of the Senate, who up until the 17th amendment were chosen by the local state representatives. Indirect representation was meant to prevent “mob rule”. There is now no real difference in the makeup of the Senate and House of Representatives. Undoing the 17th amendment would only result in even worse corruption and factionalism, but the idea of indirect representation is the correct idea. After batting ideas around with GPT4 for a while, it seems one palatable amendment might be a three-fold change: 1) a 1-term term limits for Senators, 2) forbidding party primaries for Senate elections, and 3) changing Senate elections to Senate nominations, where any candidate who receives more than 20% of votes is sent to the current Senate for confirmation — the existing Senate, including the outgoing Senators, decide which of the nominees are to be confirmed. Confirmation is done Papal style — nobody goes home until the new Senators are confirmed by 2/3 majority. Combining a 1-term limit with Senate self-confirmation means that more candidates have a chance of becoming a Senator without having to resort to demagoguery or factionalism, and that over time the composition of the Senate will trend away from power hungry individuals to civic-minded servants.
theoldlove 3y ago
The Constitution is almost 250 years old. It’s amazing for its time, but it’s now the oldest written constitution still in use and long since improved on by its many imitators and copies. We probably should replace it.
- hiram112 3y ago
  I imagine your politics swing left and progressive, right? Which is why this article is kind of absurd, in my opinion, as it tags the right / Republicans as those who are abandoning the Constitution. Every poll or social study I've seen shows that progressives - especially the younger generations - have views similar to yours i.e. not much reverence for the Constitution, the founders, etc. They are most likely to believe that freedom of speech is less important than moderating "hate speech." They believe the 2nd amendment right to bear arms is ridiculously out of date in a modern society, etc.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - defrost 3y ago
    I imagine their politics fall fully 100% in line with those of Benjamin Franklin: I confess that there are several parts of this constitution which I do not at present approve, but I am not sure I shall never approve them ... In these sentiments, Sir, I agree to this Constitution with all its faults, if they are such; because I think a general Government necessary for us, and there is no form of Government but what may be a blessing to the people if well administered, and believe farther that this is likely to be well administered for a course of years, and can only end in Despotism, as other forms have done before it, when the people shall become so corrupted as to need despotic Government, being incapable of any other. etc. Franklin literally believed the Constitution as it stood had a political half life and would be eventually gamed and run around on technicalities. https://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/documents/a7s3.html https://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/documents/a7s3.html Forget your polls & social studies .. the actual OG Founder had not much reverance for the Constitution and would likely be appalled by your apparent raising up of it onto a sacred pedestal.
rayiner 3y ago
The Constitution was abandoned about 90 years ago, when FDR threatened to pack the Supreme Court in order to enable his vast expansion of government. For the better part of a century, you’ve essentially had the executive branch exercising both the lawmaking power and the judicial power. An executive branch agency can make a law and then prosecute you for violating it in front of an employee of the agency. Federalism has been completely upended, with the federal government getting involved in everything from local policing to local education.
- anon373839 3y ago
  > The Constitution was abandoned about 90 years ago, when FDR threatened to pack the Supreme Court Not really. Threatening to pack the Court may have violated custom, but did not violate the Constitution itself, since Congress has the power to set the number of justices. This actually highlights the more fundamental problem: the constitution is structurally imperfect and, really, is totally inert without accompanying norms and customs to make it mean something. Unfortunately, the debate about what those norms and customs should be and how they should be developed and enforced is spoiled by philosophical and tribal gulfs that seemingly cannot be bridged.
  - rayiner 3y ago
    > Threatening to pack the Court may have violated custom, but did not violate the Constitution itself, since Congress has the power to set the number of justices. The threat of court packing didn’t destroy the constitution. It was the Supreme Court decisions made under the threat of court packing.
    - pauldenton 3y ago
      The landmark being Wickard v. Filburn which established that grain you grew on your own property and sold to no one, using it to feed his family and animals actually fell within the Commerce Clause because if he didn't grow that wheat he would have bought it in a store, and the wheat in that store would have likely crossed state lines, so wheat he grows on his own property that never leaves his property nor is sold is actually interstate commerce
notmypenguin 3y ago
The MAGAS have taken over the GOP. Rank and file GOP now openly espouse Qanon precepts. It’s standard fare to speak of gutting support for Ukraine and of support for Putin. We witnessed a physical coup attempt Jan 6th, rallied by Mr Trump and yet his GQP colleagues are literally running interference for Trump, attempting to stymie any attempts at accountability. Barring some extremists who call FDR “radical”, I cannot see the case for “both sides ism” It’s apparent to me that ONE party has chosen attempting to gain ABSOLUTE POWER in lieu of helping the nation or staying true to the constitution. The stacked Supreme Court is a point in case: McConnell blocked Obamas single appointee that he had a right to appoint and this was a violation of the constitution.(no mention of election calendar in appointments) Trump then railroaded through Congress an unprecedented 3 justices! Unheard of. Absolute power grab. No surprise that they overturned Roe v Wade. I see América on the precipice and the GQP trying to push it over the edge. If Trump gets in in 2024, we won’t see presidential elections again. He admires banana republic dictators and hates due process
- Nevermark 3y ago
  I mostly agree. Especially with the alarm you are expressing. I don’t like to be one sided, and certainly have heard people on the left falling for the idea that due process isn’t necessary to make important enough changes (in there opinion), I.e. supporting extreme judicial activism, institutional capture by ideologues, etc. But elements of the Republican Party are preparing to wash away formal and legal limits and bipartisan/non-partisan fire walls to unfettered power for their faction, in an organized way, if they get Trump elected. [0] A lot has been learned about the vulnerabilities of our voting and executive branch systems. Those efforts are unlikely to evaporate post-Trump. It is a rather scary time. Scary enough for a recent Republican presidential candidate to express great worry about his own party. That’s a colossal red flag. And I see the far left’s less extreme loss of respect for the constitution as counter productively providing right extremists with soft targets for their own otherwise manufactured “alarm”. [0] https://www.pbs.org/newshour/amp/politics/conservatives-aim-to-restructure-u-s-government-and-replace-it-with-trumps-vision https://www.pbs.org/newshour/amp/politics/conservatives-aim-...
- dllthomas 3y ago

17 points by clouddrover 3y ago

"The Constitution is just a piece of paper." - GW Bush Whether he actually said that, or merely behaved accordingly is really irrelevant. The Constitution has been shredded for the last quarter of a century. But political parties and most people just don't care about that. The US is in a death-spiral. Look around you. Is this the way things were back in 2000?

toomuchtodo 3y ago
https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/03/10/the-polarization-in-todays-congress-has-roots-that-go-back-decades/ https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/03/10/the-polar... https://www.axios.com/2017/12/15/how-american-politics-went-batshit-crazy-starting-with-newt-gingrich-1513306860 https://www.axios.com/2017/12/15/how-american-politics-went-... https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2016/07/how-american-politics-went-insane/485570/ https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2016/07/how-ame...
anon373839 3y ago
> The US is in a death-spiral. Look around you. Is this the way things were back in 2000? I think society was more cohesive in 2000. Multiculturalism, globalism, and technological changes (example: the filter bubble) have eroded cohesion not only in the US, but also in other populous, ethnically diverse societies. Yet, I think this “death spiral” take is a touch dramatic. Our short history is lined with one constitutional crisis after another.

wfurney 3y ago

https://archive.ph/SkKbm https://archive.ph/SkKbm

dismalpedigree 3y ago
This is continuously presenting me with a captcha in a loop. :(
- wfurney 3y ago
  Works for me on a dedicated IP. They were down the other day so maybe some residual issues. Try here https://web.archive.org/web/20230915001212/https://www.theatlantic.com/newsletters/archive/2023/09/mitt-romney-retirement-senate-constitution/675327/ https://web.archive.org/web/20230915001212/https://www.theat...
- defrost 3y ago
  You're most likely working with Cloudflare DNS which doesn't play nice with archive.{xxx} (or vice versa). Flushing and switching to Google | Quad9 | AdBlock DNS might fix that for you.
- o11c 3y ago
  Pretty sure it does that for everybody in the modern IPv6 world.

OfSanguineFire 3y ago

Surprised to see this article makes a case only about the Republican Party's loss of interest in the Constitution. I personally know more Americans on the opposite end of the political spectrum and have heard the Constitution called illegitimate due to absence of input from BIPOC at its creation, or that the First Amendment is harmful because it does not curtail hate speech. The Second Amendment in the age of more powerful weapons than existed in 1787, is a popular subject of debate at this and similar sites. Thus, there seem to be a broad array of Americans who no longer feel invested in the guiding document of their polity, which might augur tumultuous times as factions strive towards some new foundation for a country.

pauldenton 3y ago
It's surprising people haven't lost more faith in the Constitution given the last 3 and a half years since March of 2020 People didn't realize that things like Freedom of Assembly had a political check, where protesting lockdowns is killing grandma but protesting the police is stunning and brave.
rayiner 3y ago
[flagged]
- jeezfrk 3y ago
  [flagged]
paulddraper 3y ago
> surprising Can't be surprised if it's from The Atlantic :/
wildermuthn 3y ago
I agree that disavowal of the Constitution isn’t restricted to one party, but would go further: the Constitution isn’t really intended for “the people” at large. It’s intended for the set of people who would rise to power in its absence — call them the ruling classes. It’s an agreement between the powerful that this is how we get along, this is how we share and restrict power, this is how we maintain a government that avoids the descent into tyranny or dissolution. It may be that the Constitution is no longer a viable means of ensuring the peaceful transfer of power and of facilitating good-enough governance. It certainly has failed dramatically in the past to prevent civil strife. Is there an amendment that can fix whatever is wrong with the current situation and bring the elites back to the same page? What is wrong with the current situation? The fundamental problem is that the USA now thinks of itself as a direct democracy rather than a representative democracy and that modern technology has fueled the worst populist instincts of our population, creating an atmosphere ripe for demagoguery and factionalism. The Constitution had a solution for this — the indirect representation of the Senate, who up until the 17th amendment were chosen by the local state representatives. Indirect representation was meant to prevent “mob rule”. There is now no real difference in the makeup of the Senate and House of Representatives. Undoing the 17th amendment would only result in even worse corruption and factionalism, but the idea of indirect representation is the correct idea. After batting ideas around with GPT4 for a while, it seems one palatable amendment might be a three-fold change: 1) a 1-term term limits for Senators, 2) forbidding party primaries for Senate elections, and 3) changing Senate elections to Senate nominations, where any candidate who receives more than 20% of votes is sent to the current Senate for confirmation — the existing Senate, including the outgoing Senators, decide which of the nominees are to be confirmed. Confirmation is done Papal style — nobody goes home until the new Senators are confirmed by 2/3 majority. Combining a 1-term limit with Senate self-confirmation means that more candidates have a chance of becoming a Senator without having to resort to demagoguery or factionalism, and that over time the composition of the Senate will trend away from power hungry individuals to civic-minded servants.

theoldlove 3y ago

The Constitution is almost 250 years old. It’s amazing for its time, but it’s now the oldest written constitution still in use and long since improved on by its many imitators and copies. We probably should replace it.

hiram112 3y ago
I imagine your politics swing left and progressive, right? Which is why this article is kind of absurd, in my opinion, as it tags the right / Republicans as those who are abandoning the Constitution. Every poll or social study I've seen shows that progressives - especially the younger generations - have views similar to yours i.e. not much reverence for the Constitution, the founders, etc. They are most likely to believe that freedom of speech is less important than moderating "hate speech." They believe the 2nd amendment right to bear arms is ridiculously out of date in a modern society, etc.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- defrost 3y ago
  I imagine their politics fall fully 100% in line with those of Benjamin Franklin: I confess that there are several parts of this constitution which I do not at present approve, but I am not sure I shall never approve them ... In these sentiments, Sir, I agree to this Constitution with all its faults, if they are such; because I think a general Government necessary for us, and there is no form of Government but what may be a blessing to the people if well administered, and believe farther that this is likely to be well administered for a course of years, and can only end in Despotism, as other forms have done before it, when the people shall become so corrupted as to need despotic Government, being incapable of any other. etc. Franklin literally believed the Constitution as it stood had a political half life and would be eventually gamed and run around on technicalities. https://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/documents/a7s3.html https://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/documents/a7s3.html Forget your polls & social studies .. the actual OG Founder had not much reverance for the Constitution and would likely be appalled by your apparent raising up of it onto a sacred pedestal.

rayiner 3y ago

The Constitution was abandoned about 90 years ago, when FDR threatened to pack the Supreme Court in order to enable his vast expansion of government. For the better part of a century, you’ve essentially had the executive branch exercising both the lawmaking power and the judicial power. An executive branch agency can make a law and then prosecute you for violating it in front of an employee of the agency. Federalism has been completely upended, with the federal government getting involved in everything from local policing to local education.

anon373839 3y ago
> The Constitution was abandoned about 90 years ago, when FDR threatened to pack the Supreme Court Not really. Threatening to pack the Court may have violated custom, but did not violate the Constitution itself, since Congress has the power to set the number of justices. This actually highlights the more fundamental problem: the constitution is structurally imperfect and, really, is totally inert without accompanying norms and customs to make it mean something. Unfortunately, the debate about what those norms and customs should be and how they should be developed and enforced is spoiled by philosophical and tribal gulfs that seemingly cannot be bridged.
- rayiner 3y ago
  > Threatening to pack the Court may have violated custom, but did not violate the Constitution itself, since Congress has the power to set the number of justices. The threat of court packing didn’t destroy the constitution. It was the Supreme Court decisions made under the threat of court packing.
  - pauldenton 3y ago
    The landmark being Wickard v. Filburn which established that grain you grew on your own property and sold to no one, using it to feed his family and animals actually fell within the Commerce Clause because if he didn't grow that wheat he would have bought it in a store, and the wheat in that store would have likely crossed state lines, so wheat he grows on his own property that never leaves his property nor is sold is actually interstate commerce

notmypenguin 3y ago

The MAGAS have taken over the GOP. Rank and file GOP now openly espouse Qanon precepts. It’s standard fare to speak of gutting support for Ukraine and of support for Putin. We witnessed a physical coup attempt Jan 6th, rallied by Mr Trump and yet his GQP colleagues are literally running interference for Trump, attempting to stymie any attempts at accountability. Barring some extremists who call FDR “radical”, I cannot see the case for “both sides ism” It’s apparent to me that ONE party has chosen attempting to gain ABSOLUTE POWER in lieu of helping the nation or staying true to the constitution. The stacked Supreme Court is a point in case: McConnell blocked Obamas single appointee that he had a right to appoint and this was a violation of the constitution.(no mention of election calendar in appointments) Trump then railroaded through Congress an unprecedented 3 justices! Unheard of. Absolute power grab. No surprise that they overturned Roe v Wade. I see América on the precipice and the GQP trying to push it over the edge. If Trump gets in in 2024, we won’t see presidential elections again. He admires banana republic dictators and hates due process

Nevermark 3y ago
I mostly agree. Especially with the alarm you are expressing. I don’t like to be one sided, and certainly have heard people on the left falling for the idea that due process isn’t necessary to make important enough changes (in there opinion), I.e. supporting extreme judicial activism, institutional capture by ideologues, etc. But elements of the Republican Party are preparing to wash away formal and legal limits and bipartisan/non-partisan fire walls to unfettered power for their faction, in an organized way, if they get Trump elected. [0] A lot has been learned about the vulnerabilities of our voting and executive branch systems. Those efforts are unlikely to evaporate post-Trump. It is a rather scary time. Scary enough for a recent Republican presidential candidate to express great worry about his own party. That’s a colossal red flag. And I see the far left’s less extreme loss of respect for the constitution as counter productively providing right extremists with soft targets for their own otherwise manufactured “alarm”. [0] https://www.pbs.org/newshour/amp/politics/conservatives-aim-to-restructure-u-s-government-and-replace-it-with-trumps-vision https://www.pbs.org/newshour/amp/politics/conservatives-aim-...
dllthomas 3y ago