That’s the title of a recent book by Larry Sabato, the premier political pundit from Mr. Jefferson’s Academical Village. It came to mind last week when Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison delivered a Fowler lecture at Roanoke College. The theme was built about the cooperation between the President and Congress. When asked what she thought the legislative and the executive branch might accomplish this session, she summed it up with, “Not much.”
Her remarks outlined the continuing failure of Congress and the President to come to a compromise on major issues and the hyper-partisan nature of national politics. She opined that she had never seen it worse and blamed both parties as well as President Obama.
In the question and answer portion of the evening, someone asked about choosing a life as a politician. Her answer was thoughtful. She said that no one should spend their entire career in elected office. She recommended using the first fifteen years of employment in some useful profession while doing volunteer work in political campaigns then considering running for office. Too many politicians have been in elected office so long that they have no recollection of life in the real world, if they had ever understood it. In the world of politics she said, every decision must be nuanced against the next election cycle which does not always coincide with the best interests of the country as a whole.
She then mentioned the importance of term limits which she endorsed in her first campaign for the Senate, promising to serve only two terms; she reneged on that when she realized that her state of Texas would lose all the seniority she had gained if she stepped down. Nothing gets done in Congress without seniority. Bob Goodlatte promised before his election to serve only five terms or ten years; he is now in his 22nd year. He found the seniority scenario to be true and is now chair of the powerful judiciary committee of the House of Representatives. Term limits would require an amendment to the Constitution and the chances of that are slim to none.
The framers of the Constitution never intended for it to be a static document but to change with the times. Thomas Jefferson thought it should be studied by a constitutional convention every generation. It was on the agenda for the General Assembly this session but the sponsors didn’t even bring it to the floor last week knowing they didn’t have the votes. No constitutional convention has ever been convened and amendments have been accomplished only 27 times in 225 years. Most amazingly, the last one ratified by the states was in May 1992 which had been proposed in September 1789 and lay dormant for more than two centuries. It simply stated that Congress could not amend their duties or salaries until after an intervening election. How uncontroversial was that!
In Sabato’s book he recommends 23 constitutional items that need attention and many of them are imminently sensible, but until two thirds of the states assemblies call for a convention or Congress calls for one under Article V of the Constitution, nothing will happen. Three state assemblies have signed on to the request: Alaska, Arizona, and Georgia. That leaves only 31 more to come on board. To expect the Congress to put their jobs on the line is beyond comprehension. That would require a two thirds vote of both houses. It seems unlikely they could get that agreement on anything, let alone something as draconian as revising the Constitution.
The purpose of the convention would be to study the current applicability of the document written in 1787. It could be set up so that three fourths of the states would have to ratify any changes so the likelihood of the convention imposing amendments that were against the public interest would be slim. The fear, so say the opponents of even considering the idea, is that it would be a mechanism for federal government overreach and would impinge on states’ rights. Perhaps that is true, but is that a reason to not even discuss it?
A More Perfect Constitution is a very informative read. Now that Larry Sabato is cutting back on his teaching responsibilities at the University of Virginia, maybe he could devote the next ten years of his remarkable career to promoting the modernization of this venerable document. If nothing more than term limits, thereby removing seniority as a criterion for congressional leadership, was the result, it would be a monumental capstone to his already impressive legacy.
Hayden Hollingsworth
