Why is it that a simple majority "popular" vote can amend a state constitution, yet for the US

[madinmaryland]

Constitution it takes a 2/3 majority of both US houses and a 3/4 of the states to ratify an amendment to the Constitution.

What is wrong with this picture?

[FBaggins]

1. A few things

1) If you're talking about ME, it wasn't a Constitutional amendment... it was an existing Constitutional provision that allowed the people to override the legislature.

2) It isn't as if the vote was a secret. The people who stayed home "voted" by showing (sadly) that they didn't care enough to show up.

3) It obviously depends on the state Constitution. If this were an amendment and it only required a majority... then their framers wanted something closer to a direct democracy than a republic... that was their decision (which presumably can be fixed by amendment if the people disagree). We have the option of living somewhere else.

[paulsby]

2. well put nt

[MattBaggins]

7. Well put?

Libertarian dorkisms to justify, ironically; a blow to the face for the concept of liberty, is not "well put".

People should have their right to open their mouths permanently suspended for that "you can live somewhere else" crap. If my two neighbors want to vote to take away something from me, yet preserve it for themselves, I intend to tell them to fuck off, not just move.

[paulsby]

8. his comments were spot on as to how the law is

it was not a statement on how he/she wished the law to be

hth

[FBaggins]

15. Hey... we're family... shouldn't we get along?

That isn't libertarianism (though I have a streak).... and it's ridiculous to call that a "blow to liberty" (many here would say that the more direct democracy the better... remember how many were willing to torch the electoral college when Gore won the popular vote?).

I wasn't saying "go live somewhere else" or "like it or lump it"... I was saying "I wouldn't choose to live there if I felt the system was incorrect and I couldn't change it.

Your error is to point to a system and call it a "blow to liberty" NOT because the system itself is faulty but because the results were not to your liking.

If there were a solid majority in favor of gay marriage yet the state system required an even larger super majority... you and I both know that you would find THAT to be a "blow to liberty".

[MattBaggins]

18. No it is a blow to liberty

liberty and democracy are often at complete odds.

Democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for lunch.
Liberty is the sheep refusing to accept the outcome of the vote.

The system is not OK just because it is "democratic". Our country has at it's very core a built in balancing act between democracy and liberty. You can't vote away your neighbors house or property. You can't vote away some ones right to marriage.

No I would not find it a "blow to liberty" if the majority voted for the LIBERTIES of gay people. Liberty and Democracy are not the same thing.

[FBaggins]

21. The OP described a political PROCESS

and you called it a blow to liberty when it was really the outcome that ticked you off (and which I didn't address). My point still stands.

The position is contradicatory. The claim was that it just isn't right that a bare majority should be able to work their will... when there is no way around that fact that in today's world... the result that you would agree protected liberty is supported by quite a bit LESS than a bare majority.

[MattBaggins]

22. Yes the outcome pissed me off but it is not "the outcome" alone that I disagree with

Peoples lives, personal freedoms, and liberties shouldn't be up for vote. It's unconstitutional to try and vote away peoples rights. I am not just pissed with the outcome. I am pissed that no one is rapping on peoples heads reminding them that you can't do this in the first place.

[FBaggins]

23. The problem is that you first have to convince them that it's a "right"

And I'm not arguing that point. I'm simply saying that the bill of Rights was voted on.

I completely get how you would feel that it's "taking away" an existing right... but if that right has never been legally recognized before... then they aren't (legally speaking) "taking away" the right. They're debating whether or not it should be added (and no, I'm not saying that's my position).

But I'm ok with that just as conservatives want to "change the hearts and minds" of people who support abortion rights. Yes, some would like to hammer through the courts and have a tiny number of guys in robes declare that the fetus has "rights"... but most are trying to persuade and gunning for a constitutional amendment expressing the kind of clear

I think that we would be better off as a country if recognition of gay marriage rights came though changing hearts and minds and establishing a sympathetic majority rather than hitting people over the head... resulting is too opponents who would otherwise be sympathetic (note the percentage of Democrats who want marriage defined as one man and one woman).

Though again... were I gay I could completely see preferring the head banging option.

Regardless... the OP was asking about the process and I merely pointed out what the process was and how if it HAD been a constitutional thing, each state has it's own flavor for amendments... voting with your feet is always an option if the flavor doesn't make sense to you.

Be well.

[MattBaggins]

24. No I shouldn't have to convince them. That is the courts job

We can disagree and try to be civil but if you do not mind; please take your "vote with your feet" comments and put them in a place that doesn't get a whole lot of sunshine if you know what I mean. You might be a wuss but I stand up and fight.

[FBaggins]

25. You have an odd definition of "fight"

People are talking about boycotting Maine's products (not that I was able to think of any).. how is that not voting with your feet?

I'm just saying fight within the rules or change the rules (within the rules for changing the rules). Part of "fighting" can most certainly be "the fruits of my labors and my tax dollars will go to a political entity that operates within my understanding of justice".

That is by no means being a "wuss"... that's what grownups do.

It ISN'T the courts' job. It's the PEOPLE's. You seem unwilling to try to persuade those people that the government is "of, by and for" and would rather present them with an accomplished fact. I can't see how that benefits you.

[MattBaggins]

26. Maybe we are not using the same terms

Voting with your feet to means leaving the country/state. Boycotting is "voting with your purse" to me.

I thought you were suggesting that I could leave the country which sounds like an ultra-libertarian mantra and tends to put me off a bit. Sorry if that was not the case; sometimes my disdain for the nonsense that passes for modern libertarian movement makes me get a little edgy. Just so it helps with the discussion I am a married straight male with a wonderful wife and two beautiful little girls and I live in the NY23.

I also am not the best fan of trying to boycott the state to make the point. I think the fight should be in the courts. It is a nice dream to try and "win the minds" of folks but that is far away. I want the courts to do their fracking jobs; and protect the rights of ALL OF US.

As for the fight I also harbor this little mean streak where I think people should start trying to get spiteful ballot initiatives. Try to bring back miscegenation, ban inter religious marriages, or make it so that folks have to submit to really stupid tests to prove their sex. Get initiatives that say people have to drop their pants before the justice of the peace in order to get married.

[TygrBright]

3. Because the drafters of the US Constitution knew bloody well...

...that if they allowed popular vote to amend the document, black people would be slaves until the 31st Century, and within fifty years the Union would dissolve into a seething mess.

I swear to goodness they had a Time Machine that took them to view the sad wreckage of California after 30 years of government by popular referendum.

Hail to the Founders in their prescience and wisdom!

relievedly,
Bright

[X_Digger]

4. Because the framers understood 'tyranny of the majority'

I dare say, you could get 51% of voters to agree on some pretty obnoxious propositions at any one time. If all it took was a simple majority to overturn the provisions of our founding document, it would be like building your house on quicksand. It was designed to be _intentionally_ hard to amend. And rightly so, in my opinion.

[madinmaryland]

6. If it was good for the Federal Government, why are state constititution not modeled

after it?

[damntexdem]

16. Because that is up to the states.

And note that John Adams wrote a very-different constitution for Massachusetts and did not try to "reconcile" to the U.S. Constitution.

Why should each state constitution be modeled on the U.S. Constitution?

[MattBaggins]

19. Because when it comes to the bill of rights and amendments

to the Federal Constitution; your state constitution is about as useful as toilet paper. You can't vote and amend your constitution to bring back slavery. If your state tried to rewrite your constitution to say blacks and whites, or Catholics and Jews couldn't marry; the Federal Government would tell you right where to stick it.

[X_Digger]

17. Less danger at a state level..

and even less danger at a city level. Typically, the barrier to changing town / city charters is lower than state constitutions which is lower than the federal constitution.

[sui generis]

5. it's state's rights to discriminate

unless you want an interracial marriage, then the gummint has the last say. And that is according to our fierce advocate, Mr. Obama.

But we're just as bad in defending it. We were chatting about love and fairness, to people who don't have the capacity for either, and that is OUR problem. Everyone else is already in the choir. People who don't have capacity for fairness DO understand concepts of property.

And this is about property, long before it's about politics, or tradition, or animal husbandry, or least of all, love.

I'm a grownup male with estate, life insurance, a lawfully unrecognized family, making my own decisions about who gets what if I croak, AND I pay the medical bills and living and educational expenses for everyone in my family, no air quotes.

Yet these asswipes in Maine have decided for people like me, in Maine, that my "next of kin" is my brother, or nephew or cousin, and not my life partner.

They have decided that we are not grown up enough to have a say in how our effects are disposed of, in who gets to visit in the emergency room, and whether we can share an insurance policy, claim legal guardianship of our children, and that in every legal matter our real, chosen families are considered legal strangers for all intents and purposes under the law.

That's not about love, or fairness, and I agree, it shouldn't be. It's about responsibility, and about property, and that's the only thing those kinds of unAmerican subhumans understand.

I promise you if I am ever in a state that tries to keep me from mine in a hospital, there will be a brief but acute upsurge in emergency room admissions that day, and that is not an empty promise.

[slackmaster]

10. No, states don't have rights. Only people have rights.

Yet these asswipes in Maine have decided for people like me, in Maine, that my "next of kin" is my brother, or nephew or cousin, and not my life partner.

The rights of people like you in Maine have been infringed. Power is granted by the people. Until the federal Constitution is amended to protect their rights, it's up to the people of Maine to fix that one.

[slackmaster]

9. There is nothing wrong with it

The federal Constitution defines the scope and powers of the federal government. Those powers do not include telling the states how to govern themselves.

[sui generis]

11. yes, but.

I'm paying Federal taxes, and I'm a U.S. citizen, with rights guaranteed by the U.S. constitution, including the right to be treated equally under the law.

Marriage should absolutely not be considered in the ream of state governance. Inheritance tax is paid to the U.S. government. Interracial marriage is protected, and recognized, by the federal government.

Gay Marriage? If a pretty boy like me marries a truck driving hairy lesbian (stereotypes intended as grim humor), that's a gay marriage too. Apparently nobody in the government cares what or if you do anything with your pink parts or even if you live in separate states, ironically.

The scope and powers of the federal government guarantee the exercise of civil rights uniformly. As long as there are people out there who don't believe it's a civil right, it's a state's right to not grant it, and that's just unAmerican (or rather, quite American it seems).

veh.

[slackmaster]

27. I agree that it should be, but sexual orientation is not yet a federally protected status

It will be some day soon.

The scope and powers of the federal government guarantee the exercise of civil rights uniformly.

Absolutely. The problem is that a lot of people don't respect ALL civil rights including ones they don't personally like.

[dflprincess]

14. The Federal government has stepped in when states were denying other groups their rights

It could be done again.

[MattBaggins]

20. The constitution repeatedly tells the states what to do.

There is a whole slew of amendments and a bill of rights to do just that.

[slackmaster]

28. There is also that pesky Tenth Amendment that very specifically limits federal powers

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

[KamaAina]

12. You'd never know it now, but initiative and referendum were originally progressive reforms

the idea was to allow the people to override corrupt legislatures, back in the day when lobbyists carried around wads of cash instead of coke, hookers and Pampers.

In the age of modern mass media, that paradigm has been turned on its head. Wealthy special interest groups like Big Oil, Big Pharma, and Big Religion pump million$$$ into media blitzes designed to get ignorant voters to bypass the will of better-informed legislators.

[damntexdem]

13. Because each constitution determines how it can be amended.

Especially so since the U.S. Constitution doesn't address the issue of amending state constitutions (and would never had been ratified had such a clause been included) and leaves much up to the states.

Further, it does seem reasonable that the BASIC law for the nation is harder to amend than those of parts of the nation.