Trump has reportedly narrowed his list of Supreme Court candidates to three, and the media are beside themselves trying to guess who he will pick.
Their frenzy echoes that of both Democrats and Republicans who are equally terrified and jubilant, respectively, at the prospect of any of the three candidates replacing swing justice Anthony Kennedy.
The fervor surrounding Trump’s pick is understandable: over the last 100 years, the Supreme Court has rewritten the Constitution. What was once a short, simple document has become a 3000-page tome empowering the feds to dictate state and local policy. These decisions have done more to amend the Constitution than all of the official amendments combined.
That’s why people who object to an Article V Convention of States are working from a false assumption. They believe that the Constitution should be “left alone,” when in reality the Courts have already altered our founding document beyond recognition.
The Court has given D.C. almost unlimited power to rule and spend on any topic. It’s empowered the executive to ignore the will of the people, and it’s empowered itself to “apply” the Constitution in ways that look more like legislation than adjudication.
The Convention of States Project, then, doesn’t seek to alter the principles in the Constitution. Rather, we’re hoping to restore those principles.
The Constitution imagines a limited federal government that can rule on a very select set of issues. All other matters should be left to the states and the people, and that’s precisely how the COS Project is seeking to amend our founding document.
The COS Project supports amendments that limit the power and jurisdiction of the federal government, mandate fiscal restraints on Congress, and impose term limits on federal officials (including SCOTUS justices). These amendments won’t change constitutional principles. They’ll restore those principles to their rightful place in the American system of government.
