The following excerpt was written by Convention of States National Legislative Strategist Rita Dunaway and originally published on The Stream.

I’ve never been a big believer in “New Year’s Resolutions.” But I do believe that as we transition from an old year to a new one, we should pause to reflect. What lessons have we learned? And how do we hope to grow and improve in the coming year?

We must first ask these questions of ourselves. Then we should apply them to our family, community, and culture. In this spirit, I offer five of my own hopes for America in 2019.

A Resurgence of Decency

I hope that we have witnessed the far end of the pendulum swing toward a coarse, lewd, vulgar society — that the pendulum will now begin to swing back toward decency. Like foolish children stuffing themselves with sweets until they vomit, our society has gorged itself on sex without boundaries, profanity, substance abuse, and gratuitous violence until surely we are growing quite sick of it all.

The law of diminishing returns applies to bad behavior as to anything else. Behavior that appeals to us at first because of its novelty or shock value must ultimately lose that appeal and stand on its own merits. So now that profanity, violence, and sexual immorality are commonplace, what is their appeal?

I hope that these cultural poisons have run their course, and that we can move toward appreciating goodness, beauty, and love. I hope that we will look back on our acceptance of indecency with the same horror we feel when we consider the crowds who once cheered before the guillotine.

More Honest, Thoughtful, and Gracious Public Discourse

This isn’t an accusation directed at one political party. It is my hope for everyone who participates in public policy discussions. We can all do so much better.

For starters, let’s have thoughtful conversations that focus on the real points of disagreement. It does no one any good for us to pretend the other guy hates poor people or wants to bankrupt America. We should stop focusing on over-simplified tweets that appeal to our “base,” and start learning how to listen, understand, and only then to speak graciously of our own ideas.  

Let’s work on being more honest in the way we use language as we make our cases. Aborting a baby is not “health care,” and the estate tax is not the same as a “death tax.” It’s time we moved beyond facetious labels and talked about the values at issue.

Restoring the Rule of Law and Constitutional Government

Over the centuries since we adopted our Constitution, we have greatly damaged its authority. Bad court precedents, zealous Congressmen, and ambitious presidents have combined to produce a great disconnect between what the Constitution says Washington may do and what Washington actually does.

In other words, our federal government is no longer operating according to the rule of law. I hope that in 2019 we will see the states band together to use their constitutional power under Article V to correct this situation. Washington will not do it on its own.

Click here to read Dunaway's final two hopes.

Want to help bring about the restoration of constitutional government? Sign the Convention of States Petition below to let your state legislator know you're a member of the Article V movement!