Conclusion: A New U.S. Constitution

Posted on September 20, 2024 by Professor Taboo

It is finally here, finally published, the final part of my 7-part series A New U.S. Constitution. It has been a long time coming hasn’t it? My apologies for its delay. When I began this series in September and October 2022 I had no idea it would be delayed repeatedly due to my living situation these last four years. I had little idea just how busy I was to become.

But that is life, is it not? Frequently we have unexpected, unforeseen events and circumstances throughout our journey that can redirect one’s daily life or turn it upside down completely. That is precisely what happened to me: my Mom’s severe dementia became Early Alzheimer’s Disease. And my daily/nightly schedule is dominated by her needs and care between 10-14 hours per day and night, 365, no breaks except when she’s away on an infrequent 5-night respite for my sanity. As many of you know, the disease only gets worse. It is this prognosis and reality that has derailed my previous free-time and efforts to completing this series in a timely manner.

Even so, enough about lost time and her disease and on to the conclusion of A New U.S. Constitution.

When we left off with Part 6, I stated that in this part I would delve into the detailed problems of Gerrymandering, the conclusion, and consequently gerrymandering was further exacerbated by the 2019 Supreme Court ruling of Rucho v. Common Cause. That SCOTUS decision had tremendous detrimental affects on this republic democracy causing distortions upon election outcomes today. I also stated in Part 6 that this nation’s citizens, along with our public officials at state and federal levels, must construct a 21^st-century electing system that allows proportional representation. Proportional representation reflects the correct definition of a republic democracy, the one that most all of our Founding Fathers intended within the Charters of Freedom.

Gerrymandering Under the Microscope

Generally speaking, gerrymandering in the United States is the long standing practice of drawing, or redrawing, geographical boundaries of electoral districts in an intended manner that gives your political party a clear advantage over your (hated?) political rivals, i.e. partisan gerrymandering. In this way it can also (greatly?) dilute the voting power of undesirable ethnic and/or linguistic minority groups opposing your political party, i.e. racial gerrymandering. This legalized political and racial discrimination during elections was begun in 1812 with a law enacted by Massachusetts Governor Elbridge Gerry. So… what is gerrymandering in a more specific, explicit form?

Today, this legalized discrimination and partitioning of registered U.S. voters, or to-be registered voters, looks like this in 2011 to the present day:

…in states where Republicans drew the [geographical] lines, they won 72% of the [legislative] seats with just 53% of the [total] votes [cast]; in states where Democrats drew the lines, they won 71% of the seats with just 56% of [total] votes [cast].

— Lawrence Lessig, “Republic, Lost: How Money Corrupts Congress“, p. 27.

State government trifectas is a popular term that describes one political party’s control and domination over 1) a state’s governorship and both chambers of the state’s legislature, i.e. 2) the senate chamber and 3) the house chamber, thus making the trifecta. “As of September 18, 2024, there are 23 Republican trifectas, 17 Democratic trifectas, and 10 divided governments where neither party holds trifecta control” according to BallotPedia.org. For at least six years from 2015 until 2021, then later fortified over the Trump years (2017–2021), the Mitch McConnell years (1985–2024)—now Senate Minority Leader—the Republican domination through gerrymandering, and today through Senator McConnell, has greatly strengthened partisan and racial gerrymandering in many states, 28-states out of 50 to be precise. And it is well-known what political-racial minority group in America has been losing ground the last 40-years: white voters. Yet, remarkably white American voters maintain disproportionate control and power in most state legislatures, particularly in states with sparse population densities, or a few people living on large swathes of land.

This glaring imbalance begs the question, at least for me… Today, do our state and federal governments represent actual American citizens/voters, the people, or do they represent land-sizes, great non-human areas, non-voters and wealthy business-corporations? The latter, which is to say 18^th-century early 19^th-century farmers, large plantation owners, etc., represented what the United States was in the distant past, barring of course mega-wealthy corporations. However, in 21^st-century America, democracy should represent the former, that is to say the live and breathing individual American humans, voters, citizens, and their economic GDP contributions just as equally, if not more, but not a business entity such as corporate America. But to the demise of our democracy today Americans are being less and less represented by their governments and politicians. Today, it is not an actual representation of the American populous, individual citizens. And that folks, is NOT a republic democracy in its purest raw form.

A study in 2019 revealed that over the past few election decades, gerrymandering had shifted election outcomes for as many as 59-60 of 435 legislative seats in the House of Representatives. That is a significant shift given the wide ethnic cultural diversity of the American population, i.e. nonwhites. Gerrymandering causes several major controversies about whether or not we truly are a republic democracy, as we publicly proclaim to the world, and perhaps the biggest controversy is whether our Founding Fathers intended us to be back in 1781–1800 (i.e. bound to and living in the 18^th-century accordingly) or rather progressing along with the times, with the living, not the dead.

**The Rucho v Common Cause SCOTUS Decision**

You can easily Google or search on your own what the Rucho v Common Cause Landmark Supreme Court decision was all about. However, in my own opinion and background in American history, Social Studies, and U.S. federal and state government as a former certified/licensed educator/teacher, I would personally declare that the Supreme Court’s decision was a disgraceful cop-out. As Wikipedia (and others) define the landmark decision, it was:

[As the Court determined] partisan gerrymandering may be “incompatible with democratic principles”, the federal courts cannot review such allegations, as they present nonjusticiable political questions outside the jurisdiction of these courts.

And yet, one of the U.S. Supreme Court’s basic duties is to do exactly what they claimed they couldn’t do, “review allegations” dealing with our Constitution’s “democratic principles.” And over the last 245-years of this country’s existence, that is precisely what the Supreme Court was created to do and to have legal oversight over the legislative and executive branches, i.e. Checks and Balances! They cowardly copped-out on their sworn responsibility to properly interpret the spirit of our Charters of Freedom and how they apply, and specifically our federal Constitution’s interpretation and application. Here is what happened in 2016 in the words of George W. Van Cleve:

In Rucho, plaintiffs in two companion cases—one from North Carolina and one from Maryland—challenged those states’ congressional district maps as unconstitutional partisan gerrymandering. The facts of Rucho provide good examples of gerrymandering. In North Carolina, Republicans who controlled its state legislature had redrawn its congressional district boundaries to maintain a 10-3 Republican congressional seat advantage, despite the fact that just a few years previously Democratic candidates had received a majority of the statewide congressional vote. In 2016, North Carolina Republicans won 10 out of 13 seats despite receiving only 53 percent of the statewide vote; in 2018, they won 9 out of 12 districts with 50 percent of the vote.

— Rucho, Kagan, Justice, dissent (joined by all minority Justices), 139 S. Ct. 2484, 2509-11.

Essentially, today’s gerrymandering is no different than adjusting the rules, or rigging the game to your favor in order to win as many times as possible. I ask you, is that a pure fair market, an equal playing field for everyone in a supposedly free-enterprise capitalistic model that so many radical patriots here today rave about and proclaim as their “democracy, freedom, and liberty?” No, it is not. It is nothing but cheating in order to gain an upper-hand over your opponents. That is not a republic democracy.

And yet, the Supreme Court cowardly washed their hands of responsibility toward Constitutional limits to get in bed with partisan and racial gerrymandering, no matter how enormously it distorts, maligns fair election outcomes. In 2019 the Supreme Court succumbed to ideological lines of pressure instead of to the U.S. Constitution, the rule of objective law, and they handed power over to partisan, discriminatory prejudices of geographic gerrymandering. And yet still, our Constitution does indeed contain very specific provisions that allow the court oversight, supervisory authority over fair or unfair elections. The SCOTUS blatantly ignored it.

Justice Kagan’s vigorous—indeed scathing—dissent in Rucho, written on behalf of four justices, insisted that the Constitution required an end to partisan gerrymandering because it violated several provisions of the Constitution and directly undermined democracy.

— George W. Van Cleve, “Making a New American Constitution.” Maroon Bells Press. Kindle Edition, 2020

Furthermore, Kagan’s dissent argues that our long history of partisan racial gerrymandering has always been based upon the majority, and that is completely irrelevant. Why? Because the practice of gerrymandering completely FAILS to meet the modern, proper democratic standards of what it means to be truly a republic democracy. One must remember that we are no longer living in the late 18^th-century!

However, the Rucho v Common Cause Supreme Court decision has even further ramifications for our future elections and the views, the positions and roles of the Supreme Court in our correct interpretations of our Constitutional system, not just in the 18^th-century, but more importantly the 21^st-century! Remember, Thomas Jefferson and the other five core Founding Fathers all agreed that:

The question Whether one generation of men has a right to bind another, seems never to have been started either on this or our side of the water. Yet, it is a question of such consequences as not only to merit decision, but place also, among the fundamental principles of every government. The course of reflection in which we are immersed here on the elementary principles of society has presented this question to my mind; & that no such obligation can be so transmitted I think very capable of proof. I set out on this ground, which I suppose to be self-evident, ‘that the earth belongs in usufruct to the living’: that the dead have neither powers nor rights over it.

— Thomas Jefferson, in a personal letter to James Madison, Sept. 6, 1789.

The very basic legislative essentials of our Constitution and other sacred democratic documents were all designed to be adjusted, to be tweaked, to be updated as necessary, to present times and conditions—not bound by or to the dead. Therefore, let us fully understand the many curses of political and racial gerrymandering discrimination we have presently:

Gerrymandering is an important factor in preventing the emergence of such national proportional representation. It helps block changes in the partisan balance in government office holding even if developing a better balance between the major parties is what many, or perhaps even most, voters in our divided country would prefer. By preventing a partisan balance that reflects voters’ choices, it also hinders the development of more bipartisan, consensus policies by the national government, something many voters would quite likely also prefer. Notably, however, the Court’s [2019] decision—and even the minority’s sharp challenge to it—both also effectively sanction our existing majoritarian electoral system, i.e., a two-party system that political scientists agree effectively discourages require proportional representation of minority parties.

— George W. Van Cleve, “Making A New American Constitution,” Maroon Bells Press. Kindle Edition, 2020

Proportional Representation – What Is It?

Throughout human history—going back many 100,000 years—humans have always had self-imposed biases and prejudices. Hence, it is no surprise that the concept of proportional representation in one’s ruling government has vehement proponents and vehement detractors based upon their own (unfounded?) biases and lifetime experiences. Or the same could be said based upon legitimate data and objective human experiences too. What is well-known and proven is that proportional representation may or may not always represent the majority opinion. That is not a bad thing.

Whether the diverse political-social landscape is or is not representing many viewpoints, the fact that its condition offers choices, choices other than one single dominant ideology (that could very well be evil and horrendous for the common good), a wider range of concepts will more often than not give civilizations more choices for a greater good. What MUST be present in a pure election system and governing is free civil discourse. Without free civil discourse, civilizations are destined for total collapse. Ideologies only represent a theory, something that is not tested or reflective of actual human experience. In other words, a concept-theory or ideology may not represent actual data, evidence, or real-life experiences of very actual living. That life-void is possibly a delusion, a life experience that only exists in one person’s own head. It simply does not represent the majority of experiences by humans.

So to be clear, our need, NO… our perceived requirement to think outside of our own selfish needs for a greater good, a greater nation, a noble concept that our own individual biases, our own individually centered ideals have to exist with multiple choices, with answers and consequences that sometimes make us uncomfortable, make us feel awkward, but done so in order to benefit those outside of ourselves. Our electoral system should be no different; we MUST allow it to function outside of individual biases, ideologies, and our own tiny miniscule perceptions.

Inside that framework, the entire election system can be freely examined outside of the political influences and enormous vested interests of our existing major political parties and their millions-billions of dollars that influence minds like a cancer. And even more significant, we should objectively examine our unelected Supreme Court Justices, whose SCOTUS members are political biased theoreticians and who have never had to face an election, much less run a federal government.

In the end, our Constitution’s major political institutions are irreparably flawed as is the basis for a modern representative government. Our current institutions do not provide for adequate representation of the national popular will, for two reasons.

First, they do not meet modern standards for democratic representation. Our constitution now provides increased “generation-spanning” political power to Presidents and the Supreme Court. More significantly it also allows both the presidency and the Senate to be controlled by minority parties. Further, the Constitution, as now interpreted, allows unfettered gerrymandering to continue and permit the two major parties to exclude minority voices entirely from representation in Congress. That is the antithetical definition of democracy.
Second, under our current Constitution’s rules, presidential elections and the operations of Congress increasingly distort the popular will in ways that the Founding Fathers did not foresee, and could not have possibly foreseen the very probable consequences. They would not have approved this by any means. The Constitution’s major institutions have failed, as a basis for representative government, and non-participatory Americans have willing allowed this. So apparently, it would seem, nothing can be done to remedy any of these growing shortcomings by means of free-standing constitutional amendments, by which a pure republic democracy could in fact change. However, this couldn’t be further from the truth. A new Constitutional Convention could and will instead be necessary to cure us of these dysfunctional conditions.

Why do so many average Americans not know this? I have that answer.

One, for the last 3-4 decades Americans and one specific American political party has relentlessly attacked our public school systems in history, social studies, and state-federal government. These four areas of general middle-school and high school curriculums have been so reduced that American teenagers, now adults, have little clue as to what the core Founding Fathers intended for their nation. Most American 1^st thru 12^th grade public educational institutions exclude these four VITAL areas of American history/government. In private, religiously associated school curriculums these subject areas are non-existent. The Judeo-Christian (Greek, not Mishnaic Hebrew that was Jesus/Yeshua) Bible and its theological doctrines, are forced-taught… oppressively and relentlessly to indoctrinate. The GOP dresses up their prejudicial attacks via “school vouchers” for families of religious extremists.

Secondly, far too many American voters do not participate in their own governing, the very basic national privilege and virtue (or gift?) that our democracy still (barely) provides to them. Sad, very sad.

Nevertheless, there is still a chance for us to save this sinking ship that is American democracy. But the only way this can happen is for average Americans to seize their given rights as citizens to self-determine how they will be governed by participating in elections AND just as important, engage with their state and federal officials regularly. And vote, of course. If this is not done by at least 70% of our population, then this country is doomed, guaranteed. Unfortunately, for several decades, voter turnout rates have been around 32%–46% give or takes 0.5-1.5 percent points. Yes, that figure is well beyond appallingly dismal. No wonder this country is in the state that it is.

Live Well – Love Much – Laugh Often – Learn Always

History Made Today

Posted on October 3, 2023 by Professor Taboo

Never before in our country’s 247-year history has a Speaker of the House been ousted, removed, and forced to vacate. In a vote of 216 to 210, Speaker Kevin McCarthy has been (for the moment) terminated for NOT being the Speaker of the House chamber! He was not the House Speaker for the Republican party, but by bound duty the Speaker of the U.S. House of Representative to legislate and get bills, acts, and appropriations done. That was his sworn duty. Period. According to a majority of his own House Republicans, he failed and failed miserably.

Since this historic vote took place earlier this afternoon, I’ve watched and heard many interviews with Republican Representatives by the mainstream news outlets, and all of the Republican Reps kept trying to harp on the national debt of $31.4–$33 trillion. It is the typical deflect and divert tactic away from the sheer chaos today’s Republican party is in… and it is their own fault, their own catastrophe they themselves created in 2010–2016.

But nonetheless, let’s look much closer, much deeper into the context of their panicked response to McCarthy’s removal: the national debt and deficit that supposedly, according to them, was caused by Democratic administrations. Grab the microscopes.

According to the Pew Research Center, a reliable established goliath in research reporting and objective fact-checking, there are five (5) facts about our accumulation of national debt that the mainstream news outlets rarely get in-depth about.

The federal government’s total public debt stood at just under $31.46 trillion as of Feb. 10^th, 2023. Nearly all of that debt – about $31.38 trillion – is subject to the statutory debt limit.
For several years, the nation’s debt has been bigger than its gross domestic product (GDP). Read the Pew article for more in-depth details.
21.8% of the public debt, or $6.87 trillion, is owned by another arm of the federal government itself. This includes Medicare; specialized trust funds, such as those for highways and bank deposit insurance; and civil service and military retirement programs. But the biggest chunk of those “intragovernmental holdings” belongs to Social Security.
The Federal Reserve System is the single largest holder of U.S. government debt. The Fed bought Treasuries in massive quantities during the COVID-19 pandemic in an effort to keep the U.S. economy from buckling under the strain of shutdowns and quarantines.
Servicing the debt is one of the federal government’s biggest expenses. Most of this spending is on veterans’ benefits and services due to wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, which is more than it will spend on elementary and secondary education, disaster relief, agriculture, science and space programs, foreign aid, and natural resources and environmental protection.

I highly recommend you read closely this Pew Research Center article.

Another source of factual data comes from ABC News May 2023 article by Alexandra Hutzler, entitled “How US national debt grew to its $31.4 trillion high.”

How did it grow to $31.4 trillion?

The national debt has grown significantly since the early 1980s under both Republican and Democratic administrations.

The largest percentage increases to the debt occurred under Presidents Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush, both of whom enacted tax cuts that led to large deficits. […]

Flashpoints that greatly contributed to the debt over the past 50 years include the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the 2008 financial crisis and the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic — the latter two prompting sweeping stimulus measures from Congress that cost trillions of dollars.
— alexandra hutzler, abc news, may 18, 2023 — accessed at: https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/us-national-debt-grew-314-trillion-high/story?id=99429867

And let me add to the last point of the COVID-19 pandemic, our administration at that time, the GOP and tRump, did very little (if anything substantial) for the preparation of this country to go to WAR against a highly contagious, lethal biological virus! I repeat, tRump and his administration never took the pandemic and public health and safety measures seriously. Hence, look what happened.

Therefore my fellow Americans, when you are bombarded by political party rhetoric and propaganda on this nation’s debt and deficit like those heard today from the House chamber members scrambling and panicking to put out all the fires caused by their own Party, look deeper, look much closer into the factual data. THAT is where you will find the nectar and honey of what they speak about truthfully, or lie about, or divert with vague ambiguous half-truths.

Live Well – Love Much – Laugh Often – Learn Always

Rating Democracy in All 50 U.S. States

Posted on August 23, 2023 by Professor Taboo

“My definition of a free society is
a society where it is safe to be unpopular.”
— Adlai Stevenson

As of August 7, 2023, the Movement Advancement Project (MAP) released its annual scorecard for each of the U.S. state’s democracy rating. As I alluded to in my previous blog-post and its comments, my home state of Texas has been passing legislation over the last two–three years which suppress the votes of non-white, anti-conservative, less-advantaged Texans or making easy convenient access to voting stations, and actual voting, increasingly difficult. Over the last 5-7 years it has been ever harder for myself to vote and/or register to vote, and I am a well-educated white man! Now riddle me that one please!

Nevertheless, I was quite interested in knowing what Texas’ scorecard reveals. Not much of a surprise to me our democracy tally has been rated “Low” (in the orange) scoring 6.5 out of 33.5 points. Personally, that’s a fair score given how noticeably more difficult it has become for me—a college educated white man—to vote or re-register to vote after my frequent moves between Dallas and Kerrville, TX for Mom’s declining dementia, and to get this year (as well as 4-yrs ago) a new renewed driver’s license. By the way, have I told you that I am an 8th-generation white Texan with no criminal record or outstanding warrants, fines, over 42-years of employment and paying my share of taxes over those 42-years? Eighth-generation means my family was here in Texas BEFORE it was annexed by the United States in 1845!

*Click here to go to MAP’s 2023 Texas scorecard and other 49 states*

As far as MAP’s “Who Votes” and “How to Vote,” two of the three main metrics for scoring, yet again, no surprise whatsoever for Texas’ abysmal ratings: Who Votes — a -0.5/5 and How to Vote — a -0.75/5. Our highest ratings? “Election Security” 4 out of 6, and “Voting in Person” 2.5 out of 5.5. Both of those better scores, yet still weak, I have explained their ~~difficulty~~ mediocrity in detail over the last decade. “Election Security” is cryptic Conservative code for Much Harder to Vote and “Voting in Person” means Hard Registering to Vote, respectively.

Curious to know what four states rate the highest in democracy’s election laws and policies according to MAP? Yes, you read that correctly, only 4 states out of 50, or just 17% of our population of 332-million Americans reside in a state with high-levels of democracy. Let me repeat, just seventeen percent of Americans! Here are those highly democratic republic states:

Washington with 31 out of 33.5
Colorado with 30 out of 33.5
California with 29.5 out of 33.5
Oregon with 26 out of 33.5

Let’s see who the last four states of the Union are with the most undemocratic elections and policies:

47. Tennessee with 5.5 out of 33.5
48. Arkansas with 5.5 out of 33.5
49. Mississippi with 4.0 out of 33.5
50. Alabama with 3.25 out of 33.5

What percentage of the American population do these four states make up? The answer: almost 6% of the American population.

The bottom-line is and what these numbers show when one reviews the entire fifty states on the MAP’s website is that a large portion of the American 50-states and their populations are NOT truly, purely democratic in their elections and policies. I don’t know about you, but I find these facts disturbing, alarming, and they need to be confronted and addressed not just by each individual (legal) American citizen, but also by your district’s House of Representatives and your district’s Senators! Are we not a Constitutional Republic democracy as written in our Charters of Freedom by all six (6) of the Core Founding Fathers? Yes, of course. Then WHY do twenty-nine (29) of our fifty states score a measly grand tally of just 16.75 (or lower) out of 33.5 democracy data-points? Those scores are abysmal!

What has happened to democracy in the United States to rate that horribly on the major points of what defines a TRUE democracy?

Try to Live Free – Love Much – Laugh Often – Learn Alot More

Part 6: A New U.S. Constitution

Posted on June 21, 2023 by Professor Taboo

The Senate of the United States shall be composed of two Senators from each State, elected by the people thereof, for six years; and each Senator shall have one vote. The electors in each State shall have the qualifications requisite for electors of the most numerous branch of the State legislatures.
— 17th amendment to u.s. Constitution, ratified april 8, 1913

The main issue and problem for what the 17^th Amendment attempted to correct for Congress, specifically for the Senate, was that Article 1, Section 3, Clauses 1 and 2 of the 1787 Constitution dictated that each state legislature appointed its own two state Senators for an initial six-year term. Regardless of the state’s population size, each state was entitled to two senators with two “equal” votes in the federal Congress. This helped reassure anti-federalists of the time, and previously covered in Part 5 of this series, that an overly centralized power-base like the federal government would not devour state’s powers but instead provide an oversight to the House of Representatives whose members were elected by popular vote by their state’s citizens.

Across the aisle, opponents countered the anti-federalist argument that within such a circle of powerful state legislatures, there existed two primary problems: 1) legislative corruption influenced by monetary gains and interests, and 2) electoral deadlocks paralyzing necessary legislations for all the people’s interests. And since the Amendments’ 1913 ratification another major problem now persists: no reelection term-limits for Senators (see Table below)—essentially an identical chronic problem today with Supreme Court Justices’ lifetime terms. Notice the lengths of service for these 25 Senators:

25 Longest Serving U.S. Senators To-Date*

senators	dates of service	length of service
Robert C. Byrd (D-WV)	Jan 3, 1959–Jun 28, 2010	51 years, 5 months, 26 days
Daniel K. Inouye (D-HI)	Jan 3, 1963–Dec 17, 2012	49 years, 11 months, 15 days
Patrick J. Leahy (D-VT)	Jan 3, 1975–Jan 3, 2023	48 years
Strom Thurmond (D, R-SC)	Dec 14, 1954–Apr 4, 1956 and Nov 7, 1956–Jan 3, 2003	47 years, 5 months, 8 days
Edward M. Kennedy (D-MA)	Nov 7, 1962–Aug 25, 2009	46 years, 9 months, 19 days
Chuck Grassley (R-IA)	Jan 3, 1981-present	42 years, 1 month, 7 days
Orrin G. Hatch (R-UT)	Jan 3, 1977–Jan 3, 2019	42 years
Carl T. Hayden (D-AZ)	Mar 4, 1927–Jan 3, 1969	41 years, 10 months
John C. Stennis (D-MS)	Nov 5, 1947–Jan 3, 1989	41 years, 1 month, 29 days
Ted Stevens (R-AK)	Dec 24, 1968–Jan 3, 2009	40 years, 10 days
Thad Cochran (R-MS)	Dec 27, 1978–Apr 1, 2018	39 years, 3 months, 6 days
Fritz Hollings (D-SC)	Nov 9, 1966–Jan 3, 2005	38 years, 1 month, 25 days
Mitch McConnell (R-KY)	Jan 3, 1985–present	38 years, 1 month, 7 days
Richard B. Russell, Jr. (D-GA)	Jan 12, 1933–Jan 21, 1971	38 years, 10 days
Russell B. Long (D-LA)	Dec 31, 1948–Jan 3, 1987	38 years, 3 days
Francis E. Warren (R-WY)	Nov 18, 1890–Mar 3, 1893 and Mar 4, 1895-Nov 24, 1929	37 years, 4 days
James O. Eastland (D-MS)	Jun 30, 1941–Sep 28, 1941 and Jan 3, 1943–Dec 27, 1978	36 years, 2 months, 24 days
Warren G. Magnuson (D-WA)	Dec 14, 1944–Jan 3,1981	36 years, 20 days
Joe Biden (D-DE)	Jan 3, 1973–Jan 15, 2009	36 years, 13 days
Pete V. Domenici (R-NM)	Jan 3, 1973–Jan 3, 2009	36 years
Carl Levin (D-MI)	Jan 3, 1979–Jan 3, 2015	36 years
Richard G. Lugar (R-IN)	Jan 3, 1977–Jan 3, 2013	36 years
Claiborne Pell (D-RI)	Jan 3, 1961–Jan 3, 1997	36 years
Richard C. Shelby (R-AL)	Jan 3, 1987–Jan 3, 2023	36 years
Kenneth D. McKellar (D-TN)	Mar 4, 1917–Jan 3, 1953	35 years, 10 months

* As of 6/17/2023 — from: https://www.senate.gov/senators/longest_serving_senators.htm

As with the transgenerational power-hold Supreme Court Justices currently possess over the American people, the Senate and Senator votes today have an even more detrimental, anti-democratic effect than they did in 1788 to 1913. With modern and recent service-lengths averaging between 35–47 total years; about 45-years of one political (partisan?) ideology or covering about two generations of Americans. Consequentially, the U.S. Senate has become a major roadblock to effective, efficient, critical governing to protect the American people during times of economic and/or public safety and general health, even sometimes life or death, e.g. COVID-19. The Senate simply does not move fast enough for modern forms of crises management. Furthermore, the lethargic 21^st-century Senatorial condition confers spurious political advantages to small tiny states, their senators, and their 18^th-century Constitutional, economic-corporate and political dominance which is gifted in gratis by two equal votes regardless of state size.

During the 1787 Philadelphia Convention and the drafting of our Constitution, many of the Founders recognized what the Connecticut Compromise would do, at least over a period of time. They could not have been more correct. As the overall population of the U.S. has reached nearly 337-million today, it means the smaller, tinier states have gained more federal money and more authority in the Senate as well as more weight in the Electoral College over the last 235-years. Both James Madison and James Wilson ardently opposed the Connecticut Compromise, and Wilson specifically spelled out that ‘equal state Senate votes would mean that a minority of voters could block the will of the majority,’ or of the American people. And this is exactly what has happened in today’s Congress.

The twenty-eight smallest states of the Union today, representing 20% of the American population, have 56% of the votes in the Senate. This disparity and distortion over two centuries now is precisely why the increased voting strength between states with wealth and population versus those without and much smaller populations has occurred, and as a result, the majority receives less and less federal representation. This is also reflected in many state governments as well. With each passing decade the Constitution’s 18^th-century “minoritarian” equal state-voting principle impacts national policies and allocation of funds more and more, too often at the expense of the greater American good.

A “New” Senate: Reflecting the Popular Will

The better welfare of the greater national good and a more truer Republic democracy by a new Senate-voting system significantly outweighs the aforementioned flaws, disparity, and distortions of keeping the 18^th-century system. If this New Senate were structured primarily on the state’s population, and to a lesser extent say the smaller-sized states’ X-quotient of wealth and resources toward the national well-being, surely this would offer a more equitable system assuring the overall national popular will was more realized. To demonstrate this reform, the following two slideshows illustrate just how a reimagined, past Senate voting would’ve substantially changed our last twenty-plus years of national policies, some of which our “Old Senate” system has had (very?) harmful consequences.

No Senate filibustering after John Calhoun (1840’s) or Ted Cruz (2013) stopping the Senate vote!

Moreover, several different variances in domestic and foreign policies (see following slides) would have certainly been enacted or rejected had a “New” 20^th– or 21^st-century Senate voting system been put in place in 1970:

Under the “New” Senate voting system, recently appointed and confirmed 53-year old Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh would have never been voted in. He would have lost by a sizable margin—approximately by 20% or more—by the twenty-two larger states (and Senators) that makeup about 80% of the American population. Justice Kavanaugh only received his confirmation because of the 28 smallest states and their (ultra) Conservative Senators’ votes. In a new Senate voting system reflective of Americans and their interests, Kavanaugh would’ve been easily rejected. To put it a different way, Judge Kavanaugh’s lifetime appointment to our highest court in the land—that will affect 2-4 generations of Americans—was accomplished purely by a fossilized relic of our 18^th-century Constitution’s “equal state Senate voting rule.” No debate.

Proof the Electoral College is Undemocratic

In 2024 Americans will elect the next President and Vice-President using the antiquated Electoral College system created by the 18^th-century mindsets held in the Constitution. By that system, all actual votes will be cast by “electors,” not the American people. This may come as a shock to some American voters. Despite their dismay, it is completely true; the U.S. is not a comprehensive democratic Republic.

The key justifications for the invention of our Electoral College imparted by Convention delegates in 1787 no longer exist today. One must remember the historical context of what the Philadelphia delegates were negotiating and fiercely debating at the time. Many of those delegates felt average American voters would not sufficiently know the candidates governing experience, educational level obtained, and much less their personal backgrounds. These conditions were further exacerbated by transportation and communication limitations for most all American voters, thus making well-informed decisions difficult at best. That scared the Ba-jebus out of nearly everyone of them—they could not risk a narcissistic demagogue President or administration getting naïvely elected, then worse become a tyrannical king or American Caligula/Caesar. Thus, the Electoral College was created for an 18^th-century nationwide citizen-conundrum.

None of these problems exist today, nor is the modern Originalist argument for the Constitution’s (divine?) integrity a persuasive argument against a purely popular vote by the people. And here is the most damaging function of today’s Electoral College: the Underrepresentation of States and their Electors. (see following Table)

state	population 2023	% of total population	electoral now	proportionate electoral	disc
1. California	40,223,504	11.92%	54	64	-10
2. Texas	30,345,480	8.99%	40	48	-8
3. Florida	22,359,250	6.62%	30	36	-6
4. New York	20,448,194	6.06%	28	33	-5
5. Pennsylvania	13,092,796	3.88%	19	21	-2
6. Illinois	12,807,072	3.79%	19	20	-1
7. Ohio	11,878,330	3.52%	17	19	+2
8. Georgia	11,019,186	3.26%	16	17	+1
9. N. Carolina	10,710,558	3.17%	16	17	+1
10. Michigan	10,135,438	3.00%	15	16	+1
11. New Jersey	9,438,124	2.80%	14	15	+1
12. Virginia	8,820,504	2.61%	13	14	-1
13. Washington	7,999,503	2.37%	12	13	-1
14. Arizona	7,379,346	2.19%	11	12	-1
15. Massachusetts	7,174,604	2.13%	11	11	0
16. Tennessee	7,080,262	2.10%	11	11	0
17. Indiana	6,876,047	2.04%	11	11	0
18. Maryland	6,298,325	1.87%	11	10	+1
19. Missouri	6,204,710	1.84%	10	10	0
20. Colorado	5,997,070	1.78%	10	10	0
21. Wisconsin	5,955,737	1.76%	10	9	+1
22. Minnesota	5,827,265	1.73%	10	9	+1
23. S. Carolina	5,266,343	1.56%	9	8	+1
24. Alabama	5,097,641	1.51%	9	8	+1
25. Louisiana	4,695,071	1.39%	8	7	+1
26. Kentucky	4,555,777	1.35%	8	7	+1
27. Oregon	4,359,110	1.29%	8	7	+1
28. Oklahoma	4,021,753	1.19%	7	6	+1
29. Connecticut	3,615,499	1.07%	7	6	+1
30. Utah	3,423,935	1.01%	6	5	+1
31. Iowa	3,233,572	0.96%	6	5	+1
32. Nevada	3,225,832	0.96%	6	5	+1
33. Arkansas	3,040,207	0.90%	6	5	+1
34. Kansas	2,963,308	0.88%	6	5	+1
35. Mississippi	2,959,473	0.88%	6	5	+1
36. New Mexico	2,135,024	0.63%	5	3	+2
37. Nebraska	2,002,052	0.59%	3	3	0
38. Idaho	1,920,562	0.57%	4	3	+1
39. W. Virginia	1,775,932	0.53%	4	3	+1
40. Hawaii	1,483,762	0.44%	4	2	+2
41. New Hampshire	1,395,847	0.41%	4	2	+2
42. Maine	1,372,559	0.41%	2	2	0
43. Montana	1,112,668	0.33%	4	2	+2
44. Rhode Island	1,110,822	0.33%	4	2	+2
45. Delaware	1,017,551	0.30%	3	1	+2
46. S. Dakota	908,414	0.27%	3	1	+2
47. N. Dakota	811,044	0.24%	3	1	+2
48. Alaska	740,339	0.22%	3	1	+2
50. D.C.	715,891	0.21%	3	1	+2
51. Vermont	647,156	0.19%	3	1	+2
52. Wyoming	583,279	0.17%	3	1	+2

Reviewing the Table above, did you note how many states are under-represented and how many are (grossly) over-represented? Nine (9) states are (very?) under-representative of their people’s votes, and thirty-five (35) states are (very?) over-representative of fewer people’s votes! Even worse, those nine under-represented states are this nation’s most populous states, with real people, yet unreal Electoral votes! In a sense, the twelve (12) overly-represented states are/have been ghosting, or inventing unreal Electoral votes since at least 1960 and the Twenty-third Amendment.

Finally, the Electoral College promotes harmful, sometimes disastrously dueling, hyper-divisive politics or duopoly partisanship between the two major parties. This deadens civic-political discourse and impedes policy reforms and/or creation as we’ve seen over the last 2-3 decades with the chasm widening more and more every four-to-eight years. If that persists, it will be catastrophic for this country as well as democracy as a whole around the world.

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In the Conclusion of this 7-part series, I want to cover more extensively Gerrymandering and the 2019 Supreme Court decision Rucho v. Common Cause and how that ruling has had very adverse affects on our Republic democracy and today badly distorts election outcomes. I will also get into HOW we must approach and construct a proportional representation system that actually DOES reflect a true democracy.

I hope those who are still following this series will find it helpful for your own civic benefits for yourself, your state, and our country. Thank you again everyone for your patience with me and my often slow writing and posting. Please feel free to leave your thoughts and comments below.

Live Well – Love Much – Laugh Often – Learn Always

Part 5: A New U.S. Constitution

Posted on May 27, 2023 by Professor Taboo

“I know no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society but the people themselves; and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise their control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to take it from them, but to inform their discretion by education. This is the true corrective of abuses of constitutional power.”
Thomas Jefferson, letter to W.C. Jarvis, 1820

The higher the education obtained by all American youth and young adults—in some cases, students in their 40’s or 50’s even—university studies have shown the more likely those citizens will be civically engaged and as a result regularly vote in national, state, and local elections with needed intellectual prudence.

*the University of Texas – Austin Clock Tower*

We now continue from Part 4. My hope in writing this series is to assemble or reassemble the vital links between civic virtues and privileges, initiate adequate literacy, and most importantly clarify and restore some historical and U.S. Constitutional literacy. In doing so, my vision and hope is that any who might read this series will find some tools and/or ideas that inspire them to become more civically understanding, thoughtful, tactful, more civically wise, respectful, and inclusively tolerant, engaged American citizens. This is truly my hope. And I am certain that our nation’s six core Founding Fathers would agree with and support this objective. First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt eloquently and profoundly put this mission into pristine focus:

“Our children [and adults alike] should learn the framework of their government and then they should know where they come in contact with the government, where it touches their daily lives, and where their influence is exerted on the government. [This] must not be a distant thing, someone else’s business, but they must see how every cog in the wheel of a democracy is important and bears its share of responsibility for the smooth running of the entire machine.”
Emphasis mine

Another hope and reason I am writing this in-depth series is really quite simple. It has already been summed up brilliantly by one of our country’s most famous prolific Presidents:

“The ballot is stronger than the bullet.”
Abraham lincoln

There is no debate whatsoever that since August of 1966, at the University of Texas Clock Tower and the random murder of 17 people, 33 wounded, gun-violence and mass shootings in the U.S. has only skyrocketed and today has become almost normal and expected. As of May 23, 2023, fifty-seven years later, domestic violence or homicide by guns in the U.S. resulting in death has already reached 16,652, of which 236 were mass shootings or mass murders. A staggering and appalling increase just in the last ten years; mindboggling really.

Obviously, during the last 20-30+ years Americans and their (representative?) Congress members are not comprehending the alarming, epidemic rise of gun-violence in their own country and townships, much less comprehending Lincoln’s famous, prophetic statement above. What has to be done? What must be done?

We have been doing NOTHING all this time,
and why is it STILL not working!?
A very dear friend of mine

One of my strong recommendations or reply to those profound quotes are 1) do precisely what Eleanor Roosevelt lays out above, 2) once gaining an above-average or higher understanding of how your own government is legally bound by/to the U.S. Constitution, get engaged with it and assure your/our government officials perform their sworn duties strictly within the U.S. Constitution’s legal boundaries. Yes, I am saying become an aficionado or Constitutional para-legal. If all of us don’t do this, we see over the last 57-years the dire consequences! And finally 3) find inspiration and initial steps or action-plans from this series to implement #1 and #2.

Let’s pickup where we left off in Part 4.

We Are Not An Athenian-styled Direct Democracy!

We were never originally designed to be or become an Athenian-styled government! Though the delegates of the Philadelphia Convention in 1787 had fire-branded arguments over how the president should be elected and exactly how much voting power individual states should have in Congress, in the end they had constructed a near satisfactory balance—that is, for 1787 and the foreseeable future. They had not, however, satisfactorily resolved the glaring issue of elites, specifically the wealthy, controlling or heavily influencing government policy at the demise of equal influence by the ordinary, “surviving” citizens. This fervent, often nasty battle both then and today is/was really about elitism and populism. It still very much matters right now in the 21^st-century and foreseeable future.

*ancient Athenian government – fresco by Cesare Maccari (1889)*

Many of us today might consider the importance of elitism vs. populism as critical to individual, political human rights. On the contrary, it was not so simple as that in 1787 during the convention in Philadelphia. The fact is that even though the original Founding Fathers believed in general civil equality, they were quite opposed to full political equality to the masses, yes, even lowly white-caucasian men, let alone non-whites or non-elites. Why?

Simple answer: pedigree and socio-educational status and merit.

Let me point out again: socio-educational achievements. That is exactly what Eleanor Roosevelt was also endorsing over 160-years later, perhaps on several levels in opposition to the original Founding Fathers’ concepts. Most of the Philadelphia delegates also felt gerrymandering was perfectly acceptable in gaining or maintaining one’s political party’s government control and interests. Believe it or not, most of the Founding Fathers felt it was quite normal to posses and to widely allow racist views/opinions, employ methods of wealth discrimination, exhibit (privately and publicly) prejudice toward non-heterosexuals, and freely show or verbalize misogynistic prejudices and behaviors. Yes, believe it or not this was indeed our lauded Founders and their well-known 18^th-century mindsets. However, after one or two generations and by the 19^th– and 20^th-centuries this began to change. A much more inclusive view of truer political equality and representation for all Americans began to emerge.

For example, popular pressure pushed into legal adoption for the 17^th Amendment:

The Senate of the United States shall be composed of two Senators from each state, elected by the people thereof, for [a term of] six years; and each Senator shall have one vote. The electors in each State shall have the qualifications requisite for electors of the most numerous branch of the State legislators. […]
Amendment Xvii, ratified April 8, 1913

Sadly, in 2020 New York elected Republican House Representative, George Santos, somehow completely bypassed, undermined, and invalidated the entire 17^th Amendment protocols and legal enforcement of our Constitution, including my emphasis of it above. How was this possible? This is the deteriorating distorted condition of our very own Constitution by our own (Republican?) elected officials not doing their proper, oath-avowed jobs. Period. No debate.

*Rep. George Santos, R-N.Y., speaks to reporters outside after an effort to expel him from the House, at the Capitol in Washington, Wednesday, May 17, 2023. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)*

Nevertheless, the popular movements of the early 20^th-century were instrumental in increasing political equality for Americans. There has been a growing confidence and fact for the long-term effects of a truer representative government that can and will make better decisions when there is much less “elite” control of our institutions, specifically by the wealthiest that far too often govern or manipulate government to serve their own personal interests. The 19^th-century progressive democratization of equal political rights in America improved the performance and duties of our representative government demanding its leaders to at least consider or truthfully represent its constituent’s broader interests and viewpoints in making legislative decisions. And more importantly, holding those government representatives accountable to their avowed office’s duties! This popular 20^th-century movement had massively profound effects for the nation and its people.

For example, the public pressure directly induced our anti-trust laws that rightly control or manage massive concentrations of economic-political power such as the Rockefeller-founded Standard Oil Trust, that is now today known as ExxonMobil, the LARGEST investor-owned oil company in the entire world. Yet, this is to be expected. Truth be known of this uniquely American tradition: history has shown our government institutions often bow to controlling groups to change government policies to favor super wealthy mega-corporations.

Our Constitution’s Flaws and Failures

Contrary to these excellent 20^th-century popular federal reforms, our antiquated 18^th-century Constitution has two different, but equally fatal flaws written into it:

They undermine and consequently violate modern standards and definitions of republican political equality.
They also repeatedly have more anti-democratic effects than when they did when they were created.

What do I mean exactly by these two flaws? For one, Supreme Court justices receive lifetime tenures when appointed, an 18^th-century mindset due to average lifespans then. Second, each state in the Union receives equal voting rights in the Senate and in the Electoral College, despite those with miniscule populations. Third, the Supreme Court’s 2019 landmark decisions stating the Constitution permits perpetual, partisan manipulations of upcoming elections via gerrymandering. Fourth, the incredibly obdurate Article V procedures for Constitutional amendments, which will be further addressed later in this series. Fifth, the Presidential powers of judicial review and veto being not just controversial, but anti-democratic as well.

The U.S. Supreme Court is often considered to reside outside of American politics, that it was originally designed to be the final arbiter of equal justice according to the Constitution and its laws. Hence, it should also act as guardian and interpreter of the Constitution and laws of the land. Though this impression of the nation’s highest court is correct in theory, it is not true in practice; never has been since 1787. Why is this? The quick simple answer is that it was never designed to be “outside” of civil or congressional-executive politics.

As mentioned earlier, justices are not elected by the general public. Justices, as also mentioned, are appointed by the standing President then confirmed by the current Senate. Justices serve on the Court for their lifetimes unless impeached by the House of Representatives, which requires a supermajority vote—i.e. 290 votes from 435 representatives—then followed by a conviction in the Senate. Obviously, impeachment is near impossible when Party-line favoritism and bias is rampant, as it is in today’s politics. Due to these 1787 design flaws, justices are literally unaccountable for their decisions by the very officials who are indeed very political!

From the very beginning, at the Philadelphia Convention, delegates imagined and drafted our Constitution for a Supreme Court composed of men chosen by a political leader, the President. And most often those personal political viewpoints of those selected men/justices aligned with that current President’s and his political party’s viewpoints. This has certainly been demonstrated since the late 1990’s but unequivocally began with President George W. Bush’s two terms.

Going back to the early 1800’s, partisan court rulings and appointments were already raging. Chief Justice John Marshall and President Thomas Jefferson exchanged heated arguments over the Supreme Court’s judicial independence, or lack of, and its final authority. Their battle started with the last minute appointments, or “midnight appointments” of strictly Federalist judges by President John Adams, himself a Federalist. Knowing full well that Marshall despised Jefferson and his Republicans, John Adam’s very last act as President and perhaps in defiance to his once closest colleague, he appointed John Marshall as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. Marshall swore in Jefferson as the nation’s third president surely under degrees of resentment by both men.

The campaigns and election of 1799–1800 went down in history as one of the most divisive, partisan campaign rancor and nastiest infighting between all three Branches of Washington D.C. in American history. However, the bitterness and power-struggles between Jefferson and Marshall did not end there.

*Political cartoons of 1800 American Presidential campaigns – (left) First Amendment issues, (right) Separation of Church & State issues*

Over the coming years legislative, executive, and judicial wars between opposed political ideologies—primarily Jefferson vs. Marshall—culminated in at least two paramount Supreme Court decisions:

Stuart v Laird — In this case, 5 U.S. 299 (1803), the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the repeal of the Judiciary Act of 1801, enacted by outgoing President John Adams and his Federalist Congress, which effectively abolished the existing circuit courts. The decision also affirmed the constitutionality of requiring Supreme Court justices to ride circuit.
Marbury v Madison — In case, 5 U.S. 137 (1803), the Supreme Court established the principle of judicial review—the power of the federal courts to declare legislative and executive acts unconstitutional. The unanimous opinion was written by Chief Justice John Marshall.

What did these two rulings mean and do exactly? In Stuart v Laird, Jefferson was able to purge all the Federalist circuit court “midnight” judges quickly appointed by former President Adams. In doing this Adams had hoped it would maintain some residual political control for his party as he departed—instead it was a win for Jefferson. In Marbury v Madison, by asserting the power to declare acts of Congress unconstitutional (which the court would not exercise again for over fifty years), Marshall (and the Federalists) claimed for the court an enormous authoritative position as interpreter of the Constitution independent of Congress and the White House—a win for Marshall and Adams.

As a result of these early 19^th-century power-authority battles, today we see the same heated, divisive political wars continue over Supreme Court Justice appointments and those justices political backgrounds and affiliations, begging the question: are modern SCOTUS justices truly “independent” of Washington D.C.’s political hostility and influences?

As the Constitution now stands and has been practiced and/or protected for the last two-plus centuries, exactly how impactful and for how long are lifetime SC justice appointments affecting this nation’s governing? Furthermore, does the Supreme Court today adequately respond to the country’s popular will? Do lifetime appointments offer frequent decisions in favor of a minority party or group?

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In Part 6: A New U.S. Constitution, I will address the problem of our modern Anti-democratic Senate and explore how we might restructure it into a more functional, civically responsive new Senate. I also plan in the next portion of the series to tackle the Electoral College, what it was designed for then, in 1804, and what it has become today. I hope all of you can join and share any thoughts or comments and feedback. Thank you as well for your continued patience with this drawn out series and understanding my daily, personal family-living situation while writing this series. My sincere gratitude to you all.

Live Well – Love Much – Laugh Often – Learn Always