Former Republican Sen. Tom Coburn told Newsmax TV a Convention of the States is necessary to bring back balance to America with the federal government's reach and spending out of control.
Coburn, who represented Oklahoma in the Senate from 2005-2015 and served in the House from 1995-2001, appeared on "The Howie Carr Show" and said the odds are good a convention will eventually be held.
"Our founders gave us a way to fix our country. It's called Article V, Convention of the States," said Coburn, who has spoken several times this year about the Convention of the States Project.
"We have 12 states who have already passed it. You gotta have 34 to call a convention, so we're well over a third there. This January we'll be starting our fourth year. I suspect we'll add four to eight states this year."
Article V of the Constitutionexplains the process of a Convention of the States:
"The congress, whenever two-thirds of both houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose amendments to this Constitution, or, on the application of the legislatures of two-thirds of the several states, shall call a convention for proposing amendments, which, in either Case, shall be valid to all intents and purposes, as part of this constitution, when ratified by the legislatures of three fourths of the several states, or by conventions in three-fourths thereof, as the one or the other mode of ratification may be proposed by the congress; provided that no amendment which may be made prior to the year 1808 shall in any manner affect the first and fourth clauses in the ninth section of the first article; and that no state, without its consent, shall be deprived of its equal suffrage in the Senate."
Coburn told Carr that federal spending is out of control and the government is in such a hole that something needs to be done.
"We have $1,600,000 worth of unfunded liabilities for every millennial in the country that's coming to in the next 50 years," he said. "Right now, the unfunded liabilities plus our debt of $20 trillion — that's $144 trillion combined — is $40 trillion more than the entire net worth of the country.
"What we have to do is restore that balance between the three branches of the federal government, between the federal government and the states. This isn't a states' rights argument, this is a balance argument so that things work."
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