Strange Brew: The Tea Party’s Constitution Features Less Democracy, More Corruption
This is the ninth installment of Constitutional Accountability Center’s new series, ‘Strange Brew: The Constitution According to the Tea Party,’ exploring the Tea Party’s erroneous claims about the Constitution’s text and history. Click here to view previous posts from this series.
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by Elizabeth Wydra, Chief Counsel, Constitutional Accountability Center
Somewhat surprisingly, even in the curious world of the Tea Party, several Tea Party Senate candidates have been asking people to vote for them precisely because they want to take away the people’s right to vote for them. In other words, they are running on a platform that includes a call to repeal the 17th Amendment to the Constitution, which shifted the selection of U.S. Senators from the state legislatures to direct election by voters. Such a repeal proposal is foolhardy—and not just because it banks on the rather ridiculous proposition that voters will turn out to vote to support taking away their right to vote.
It seems unlikely that voters will go for it. “We the People” have passed six amendments expanding the right to vote, and the entire thrust of our constitutional history is toward expanding our democratic process, not taking choices away from voters. But the movement to repeal the 17th Amendment is serious enough that the New York Times devoted an editorial piece to the issue, noting:
Allowing Americans to choose their own senators seems so obvious that it is hard to remember that the nation’s founders didn’t really trust voters with the job. The people were given the right to elect House members. But senators were supposed to be a check on popular rowdiness and factionalism. They were appointed by state legislatures, filled with men of property and stature.
Under the original Constitution, U.S. Senators were chosen not by the people, but by state legislators. Article 1, Section 3 of the Constitution provided that “the Senate of the United States shall be composed of two Senators from each state, chosen by the legislature thereof, for six years; and each Senator shall have one vote.” The 17th Amendment, ratified in 1913, was part of a wave of progressive constitutional reforms that sought to make the Constitution, and our nation, more democratic. It gave Americans the right to vote directly for their Senators, thereby strengthening the link between citizens and the federal government. (Whether Senators have been more or less able to serve as a check on “popular rowdiness” since adoption of the 17th Amendment is debatable, but considering that the Tea Party has the rowdiest party on the block right now, it is surprising that they would advocate returning to a more restrained, aristocratic vision of the Senate.) Read more »
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