Too Late For A Constitutional Convention

If you are convinced that South Dakota’s state Legislature should ask Congress to call a Constitutional Convention (AKA Article V Convention), you’re too late—by over 100 years.

And, if you think such a convention is a real solution to the problems we face in this country, and there is nothing anyone could say to persuade you otherwise, you’re simply working on the wrong state.

Here’s how it works to trigger a Convention (This is clearly spelled out in Article V itself—read it for yourself if you don’t believe me):

1.       Two-thirds of the state legislatures need to ask Congress to call a Convention under Article V to propose amendments to the Constitution. When this number is reached (As of today, that’s 34 out of 50 state legislatures) Congress MUST call the Convention.

2.       The various states don’t have to agree on why a Convention is needed. One state could ask for a Convention to propose amendment “X”, another for Amendment “Y,” and so on. What does matter is HOW MANY states apply for a Convention. Read Article V again if necessary. All it says is “on the application of the legislatures of two thirds of the several states.” There is no reference to any reason why or other qualifiers for the application to be counted.

3.       Also, logically, if one state applies for a Convention and suggests a specific amendment it would like the Convention to propose (let’s call it “Amendment A”), and 2/3 of the states still haven’t applied for a Convention to be held when the same state later applies for a Convention (this time, they suggest “Amendment B” be proposed), the total number of applications toward the magic number of 34 does not change by another application submitted by the same state. That number only changes when either

a.       A state which does NOT have any current applications to Congress formally sends one.

b.      A state which has previously made application(s) to Congress for a Convention , and has not yet rescinded all of them, rescinds all its previous application(s).

South Dakota still has at least five applications to Congress for a Constitutional Convention which are current and have not been rescinded. The first was in 1907, supporting the Progressive idea of direct election of US Senators. See them here:  http://tinyurl.com/qzgauhv

This means South Dakota is officially one of the 34 states needed to trigger a Constitutional Convention.  Adding yet another resolution urging Congress to call such a Convention, for whatever reason, will not change that.  It won’t get us any closer to having such a Convention.

South Dakota already signed the petition for a Con-Con. We can either

a.       Do nothing or apply for a Con-Con again (in which case the total number of legislatures applying for a Con-Con remains the same) or…

b.      Rescind those five remaining applications and take our state Legislature off the list of states asking Congress to call an Article V Convention.  In this case the number of legislatures applying for a Con-Con would go down.

Focusing on South Dakota CANNOT move you any closer to triggering an Article V Convention.

I share many of the same concerns about the problems our country faces as those promoting a Convention. If you really would like to know why I feel a Convention is unwise or what solutions I would propose, please contact me and find out how to participate in a “Constitution is the Solution” course.

*** Eldon Stahl*** , Mitchell, SD; (605)-999-1319; www.facebook.com/EldonCStahl; eldonstahl@hotmail.com