Answer:
No. The Founders made this very clear. Once 34 states apply, Congress has no discretion whether to call a convention and no control over the delegates (see Federalist No. 85, see paragraph beginning “In opposition to the probability…”). George Mason proposed to add the Convention of States provision to Article V because he thought Congress had too much control over the amendment process. The Framers unanimously agreed with him. It makes no sense to interpret Article V to give more power to Congress, when the whole point was to take power away.
This claim that Congress gets to choose the delegates also goes against common sense. Just because one party “calls” a convention, doesn’t mean it gets to choose the delegates for the other parties. Think about it. Virginia called the Philadelphia Convention of 1787. Did it get to choose the delegates for Massachusetts? Of course not. Massachusetts did. Each state chooses its own delegates; it doesn’t matter who calls the convention. This is Agency law 101 and basic common sense.
Physicians for COS
The diagnosis is clear.
We have a growing cancer today known as the Obamacare. As a result physicians are no longer free to practice medicine.No profession feels the full force of the federal government more than physicians. The medical profession is the most highly regulated profession in the United States. The practice of medicine is controlled, taxed, and regulated to the point of being destroyed by the heavy hand of the federal government.
Physicians are told how to bill, how much to charge, and how to treat patients. They are mandated to use expensive electronic medical records. The federally enacted HIPPA (Health Information Privacy and Portability Act) makes the communication between physicians and atients burdensome, inefficient,and expensive. Every physician is required by federal mandate to register with the government to obtain an NPI (national provider identifier.) We are required by federal law to obtain and pay for a license to prescribe medication through the DEA, which is separate from our state licensure.
This heavy hand of government not only oversees the largest federal health bureaucracy ever created, but by extension reaches into every state, every city, and every small town to regulate how every licensed physician practices the art of medicine and how citizens obtain care.
The treatment is also clear.
The prescription for a cure was written into our constitution by our founders. Article V of our constitution allows for the states to call for a convention of states to limit the power and jurisdiction of the federal government through the proposal of constitutional amendments. Physicians should be the strongest supporters of this brilliantly-crafted states’ rights tool placed into our constitution by our founders.
I urge my fellow American physicians to join with me in supporting an Article V Convention of States to take back control of the practice of medicine. It’s the only way that we can return the practice of medicine back to the intimate relationship between a doctor and patient without interference by the heavy hand of a distant, national government.
Jeffrey I. Barke, M.D. Family Physician Newport Beach, CA