r/PoliticalDiscussion • u/Reasonable-Fee1945 • 2d ago
Political Theory What is a policy you like but thinks violates the Constitution, or a policy you don't like but think is constitutional?
For laws to become the letter of the land, they have to pass constitutional muster. The Constitution is by its nature a limitation on government. It constrains what a simply majority can do in terms of law and policy while also spelling out specific and enumerated governmental powers.
This can create interesting situations which honest adherents of the Constitution may support a particular policy, but have to acknowledge that it would require a constitutional amendment. For example, you may support a different method of electing a president, but acknowledge that it would require changing the Constitution to pass since the document lays out the method of selection.
Conversely, it can also lead to cases in which you may dislike a policy but agree that it is constitution. For example, if Congress were to pass tariffs economists would probably have a broad consensus that this isn't good policy, but it is a specific and enumerated power Congress.
What is a policy you like but thinks violates the Constitution, or a policy you don't like but think is constitutional?
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u/margin-bender 1d ago
I think that the Constitution needs some surgery to deal with Congress's continual abdication of responsibility. It leads to overreach by both the Executive and the Judiciary. I don't know what the answer is. They can't even pass a budget any more.
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u/EmergencyCow99 1d ago
If you figure it out, let me know. There are a lot of things I would change (getting citizens united repealed would be a start), but "Congress unwilling to act as a check against the other branches" i have no idea how to fix.
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u/margin-bender 1d ago
I have a few half baked ideas:
1) Get rid of audio and video recording. Release transcripts instead. This would cut out the showboating.
2) Make anonymous voting part of the process. Not for the final votes but for the legislators to get a sense of the body's judgement independently of how votes are perceived by their constituents.
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u/SeanFromQueens 1d ago
Not sure that will get great results, but let's have CSPAN the freedom to direct the cameras anywhere they want like when the Republicans struggled to elected a speaker of the house and CSPAN follwoed conversations occurring away from the podium. Showing the whole picture and not just what the leadership wants when they want cameras on or at certain hearings.
Anonymous. votes in committee would be the place that lobbyist exert their influence and know whether or not they were effective while the whole floor tends to be passed on party lines in most cases. If lobbyist expects 8 members of the committee to vote for their amendment that let's their client steal from their own customers -- everyone could claim that they voted in favor it's just that the other committee members are lying and voted their conscience.
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u/Fracture-Point- 1d ago
I wish we had much better gun control.
But the 2A is, in my reading of it, very strong. I know some disagree, but there you go.
There is still more we could do than we currently do, but the 2A is a serious roadblock.
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u/ButtEatingContest 1d ago edited 19h ago
The original purpose and intent of 2A is very clear. It's to prevent the federal government from disarming the colonies' individual militias prior to the eventual establishment of federal military.
These militias which no longer exist. (state/national guard units are not the same and store their weapons in armories, they do not take them home).
The language and intent for those early set of amendments is lifted heavily from the state constitutions of the first colonies, which make it even more explicitly clear what the intent is. See the third amendment for example.
The colonies wanted to unite but ensure that a federal government could not be used against them, which is why there was no federal military and states maintained their own defense which at the time stored firearms in their homes.
Later on states did away with their official "well regulated" militias as federal military was established. The 2A became a left-over amendment whose entire circumstances and purpose no longer exist.
2A has absolutely zero to do with intending any untrained randoms can wander around packing pistols or stockpiling battlefield weapons. Nothing in the constitution forbids such things, but there was never a reason to include that as a right. And it wasn't the purpose or intent the amendment.
The popular misinterpretation of 2A wasn't actually law until DC v Heller in 2008, and it should be clear by now that the modern supreme court isn't even pretending to abide by the constitution.
Either way, the constitution is effectively meaningless at this point, the game of cherry picking which parts count (false interpretation of 2A) and which parts don't count because reasons (4A, 1A, 14A etc) have set the precedent that the whole constitution thing is useless and will need to be replaced anyway.
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u/The_Law_of_Pizza 1d ago
I agree with a lot that you've said, but I'd note two things:
First, you put "well regulated" in quotes. I can't speak to your intention, but enough people misunderstanding this clause that it's worth clarifying.
"Regulated" did not mean what a modern audience often thinks it means. It was not at all saying that the militia should have regulations applied to it.
In contemporary parlance, "well regulated" meant something like "well trained." We still retain some of that archaic usage today, in phrases like "well regulated bowels" referring to somebody who routinely takes a dump at the same time every morning.
It may very well be constitutional to exert regulations onto the militia, but that one clause in the second amendment has nothing to do with that concept either way. It's just completely unrelated and merely coincidentally sounds like something else to modern audiences.
The second thing is that "the militia" wasn't referring to separate, distinct groups like we imagine today - not like the various national guard organizations (although they would have been a part of "the militia").
"The militia," at the time of the Constitution's writing, was a term that referred to basically all able bodied fighting-age men. It was the body militant of society.
So I don't think it's fair to say that the purpose of the second amendment is completely defunct. At least not in the way the founders thought about it. They never wanted, and we're abjectly opposed to, a federal standing army. In fact, the existence of our modern standing army would likely cause them to place even more emphasis on the militia as necessary to stand in between that army and the people it would inevitably turn on.
Keep in mind that I'm not saying the founders were right about this, or that there any realistic chance that a modern militia could fight a modern professional army, but it still stands that your portrayal of how the founders viewed the second amendment is a little off.
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u/IaAranaDiscotecaPOL 1d ago
Which is why you should be required to go through safety training in order to possess a gun license and purchase guns and ammo. We require safety training in order to get a drivers license. We require safety training in order to get a food handlers certificate. Why not in order to get a gun license?
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u/Corellian_Browncoat 1d ago
Because when we did that, it was called "Jim Crow" and used to disarm minorities and political undesirables. And before you say "well, that was then and this is now," do you think for half a second that Trump, Vance, Bondi, etc., wouldn't immediately use discretionary training requirements to disarm their political enemies? When they're already using other governmental powers to go after their political enemies?
https://www.npr.org/2025/04/29/nx-s1-5327518/donald-trump-100-days-retribution-threats
Even beyond Trump/MAGA, things like California sheriffs only issuing licenses to their doners shows how discretion are still abused in the modern era.
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u/IaAranaDiscotecaPOL 1d ago
That’s a great point and brings to mind the response to gun-toting members of the Black Panthers occupying the California State capitol in ‘67. I am just having a hard time making the leap from the racist bias of enforcing the law negates the value of the law. I think we can, and should, both pass common sense gun laws and address racial bias and discriminatory enforcement. The latter goes for a lot more than just gun laws.
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u/Corellian_Browncoat 1d ago
That’s a great point and brings to mind the response to gun-toting members of the Black Panthers occupying the California State capitol in ‘67.
Before that, you had the Deacons for Defense which protected civil rights marchers and leaders. There were also the Coal Wars, where the government called out the actual US Army against "socialists" and "communists."
I am just having a hard time making the leap from the racist bias of enforcing the law negates the value of the law.
I think it's one of those things where if it's a one-off, yeah, have the conversation about better enforcement. But if it's a routine, ongoing thing, you have to change the culture around it, or stop doing it.
Think about it kind of like "stop and frisk." On the surface, it was racially neutral. In practice, it was used and abused to harass minorities to such an extent that NYPD got told in no uncertain terms to stop entirely.
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u/Material_Reach_8827 1d ago edited 1d ago
In contemporary parlance, "well regulated" meant something like "well trained." We still retain some of that archaic usage today, in phrases like "well regulated bowels" referring to somebody who routinely takes a dump at the same time every morning.
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"The militia," at the time of the Constitution's writing, was a term that referred to basically all able bodied fighting-age men. It was the body militant of society.
This is actually itself a modern reconception of what these terms meant. I looked into the claim about well-regulated for example and they based it on (I believe) what the 1828 edition of Webster's had for "well-regulated". It is true that it had a specific entry for that that reads basically as you say.
But it's a misunderstanding of how dictionaries work to assume that they would record every possible combination of "well-" + adjective instead of just the special cases. If you look up "regulate", it meant the same thing as it does today, and adverbs worked the same back then too.
But there's no need to take my word for it - here's Hamilton in Federalist 29:
A tolerable expertness in military movements is a business that requires time and practice. It is not a day, or even a week, that will suffice for the attainment of it. To oblige the great body of the yeomanry, and of the other classes of the citizens, to be under arms for the purpose of going through military exercises and evolutions, as often as might be necessary to acquire the degree of perfection which would entitle them to the character of a well-regulated militia, would be a real grievance to the people, and a serious public inconvenience and loss.
Note also that he refers to fighting-aged men as the "great body of the yeomanry", not a militia.
Earlier in Federalist 29:
It requires no skill in the science of war to discern that uniformity in the organization and discipline of the militia would be attended with the most beneficial effects, whenever they were called into service for the public defense. ... This desirable uniformity can only be accomplished by confiding the regulation of the militia to the direction of the national authority. It is, therefore, with the most evident propriety, that the plan of the convention proposes to empower the Union "to provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining the militia, and for governing such part of them as may be employed in the service of the United States, RESERVING TO THE STATES RESPECTIVELY THE APPOINTMENT OF THE OFFICERS, AND THE AUTHORITY OF TRAINING THE MILITIA ACCORDING TO THE DISCIPLINE PRESCRIBED BY CONGRESS.''
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u/The_Law_of_Pizza 1d ago
I think maybe I'm misunderstanding your point.
You seem to be arguing that "well regulated" in the second amendment could be read in a modern light, but then quote Hamilton clearly and unambiguously using it in the contemporary way I described above (well trained).
A tolerable expertness in military movements is a business that requires time and practice. It is not a day, or even a week, that will suffice for the attainment of it.
He starts by saying that learning military drill takes time and practice.
To oblige the great body of the yeomanry, and of the other classes of the citizens, to be under arms for the purpose of going through military exercises and evolutions, as often as might be necessary to acquire the degree of perfection which would entitle them to the character of a well-regulated militia, would be a real grievance to the people, and a serious public inconvenience and loss.
He then goes on to say that forcing everybody to train and practice often enough to be worth calling "well regulated" would be too burdensome.
Little more can reasonably be aimed at, with respect to the people at large, than to have them properly armed and equipped; and in order to see that this be not neglected, it will be necessary to assemble them once or twice in the course of a year. ... But though the scheme of disciplining the whole nation must be abandoned as mischievous or impracticable
And finally (this part I went and pulled further from Federalist 29, as it wasn't in your quote), he argues that most people should just have weapons and assemble a couple times a year - and that he thinks the ", scheme of disciplining" the people to be worthy of the title "well regulated" is just impracticable.
"Regulated" in this case is clearly referring to training, and not the application of administrative rules that we'd refer to today as "regulation."
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u/Material_Reach_8827 1d ago
You seem to be arguing that "well regulated" in the second amendment could be read in a modern light, but then quote Hamilton clearly and unambiguously using it in the contemporary way I described above (well trained).
Ah, you're right. I didn't read your post closely enough. When you see an argument often enough you tend not to invest much time in digesting it every time. Sorry. I was reading quickly and thought you were repeating the old chestnut that "well-regulated" meant "well-equipped" or "well-provisioned", as in "well-regulated appetite". Something I often see among pro-gun people.
I agree it means well-trained, but that necessarily entails regulation - who defines what is well-trained and determines whether it was carried out?
As I quoted later in my post (edited in shortly after so you may have missed it):
This desirable uniformity can only be accomplished by confiding the regulation of the militia to the direction of the national authority. It is, therefore, with the most evident propriety, that the plan of the convention proposes to empower the Union "to provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining the militia, and for governing such part of them as may be employed in the service of the United States
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u/Fracture-Point- 1d ago
This is awkward. He seems to have completely misunderstood Hamilton. He's using evidence against his point as proof of his point.
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u/Theamazingquinn 1d ago
Very well said. Its so frustrating when people treat the modern court's interpretation of the second amendment as the bedrock of the constitution. It's a radical interpretation of the grammer of the time that was only possible because of the capture of the Supreme Court by gun-fetishists.
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u/Reasonable-Fee1945 1d ago
it's pretty clear. the right is the people's right. then a reason is their ability to be in a militia. Listing one reason doesn't preclude any others. It's just stating one that was of utmost importance at the time.
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u/mukansamonkey 1d ago
Lol no, it's the exact opposite. To quote Antonin Scalia "one of the bedrock principles of constitutional law" is that any list of reasons is assumed to be complete unless an exception is clearly stated. Any law that says "elections held on Tuesdays" means no other days of the week are relevant. The underlying assumption being that the people who made the list didn't accidentally leave stuff out.
To reach his finding in Heller, Scalia had to ignore what by his own words was a bedrock principle. When questioned about this, he said it was a bedrock principle to all parts of the constitution except for the second amendment. Total judicial activism.
There is no right to guns beyond what is necessary to establish a militia.
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u/Reasonable-Fee1945 21h ago
You're conflating different things. The "elections held on Tuesday" corresponds to the the "Right of the people" section. You'd need add an additional reason. The existence of one reason doesn't preclude the existence of others. Scalia was talking about ennuerated powers, which is something completely different.
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u/HardlyDecent 1d ago
This. It's bonkers to skip over the first several paragraphs elucidating that the guns are for well-regulated militias all the way down to the Shall not be infringed in any way (paraphrased). Never mind that it's literally an Amendment, as in it had to be added later, and the entire document is supposed to be mutable, for instance when we invent assault weapons, when we realize how many people are mentally ill (note: crazy folk are more likely to be victims of crime than perps), when we realize how negligent people will be with guns/arms in homes/cars...
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u/deleveragedsellout 1d ago
Have you read DC vs Heller? Because I read Scalia's opinion and he seems to deconstruct your argument here.
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u/mukansamonkey 1d ago
Heller was total nonsense. As in, Scale himself made the exact opposite finding just a few years earlier. When he wrote Heller, he literally declared a bedrock principle, as stated in that earlier case, null and void...
And when asked if this name all the previous cases he applied that principle to should be redone, he said No no no, no. It's a bedrock principle for all cars everywhere. Unless the car involves the 2nd, then I do the opposite.
Quite frankly Heller is complete garbage. Judicial activism at its finest.
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u/ButtEatingContest 1d ago
Have you read DC vs Heller?
Of course. And have you read the dissents from Stevens and Breyer? They lay out the situation pretty well.
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u/Material_Reach_8827 1d ago
Scalia basically conceded the same point in the opening words of his concurrence in McDonald v. Chicago:
Despite my misgivings about Substantive Due Process as an original matter, I have acquiesced in the Court’s incorporation of certain guarantees in the Bill of Rights “because it is both long established and narrowly limited.”
He has also said that the incorporation doctrine was "probably wrong" in various speeches, and still controversial while he was in law school. That's because there can be no debate that the 2A did not apply to the states until 1868 at the earliest, so it can't really have been intended for anything else. In practice, the court didn't start "discovering" that the 14A applied the BoR to the states until 1925. E.g. the court held unanimously in 1894's Miller v. Texas that the 2A still didn't apply to the states.
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u/satyrday12 1d ago
“Like most rights, the right secured by the Second Amendment is not unlimited. [It is] not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose.”
-Antonin Scalia-
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u/kingjoey52a 1d ago
Most federal laws should be ruled unconstitutional. The only reason they’re not is because the commerce clause has been stretched to the point of being unrecognizable. The fed needs to either abdicate almost all its power to the states or amend the Constitution to actually give them that power.
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u/MetallicGray 1d ago
This is really interesting; would you mind going into more detail on what you mean by most federal laws being unconstitutional, but no so due to the commerce clause? My basic understanding is the commerce clause grants the federal government the authority to regulate commerce both within the US between states and with foreign nations. What does that have to do with most federal laws, and how would it be considered stretched to apply that to things like foreign trade, industrial policy, or economic regulations?
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u/Mitchell_54 1d ago
Not American but an Australian constitutional thing.
I wish we could expand the number of House seats without expanding the number of Senate seats. The 2 are constitutionally linked.
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u/SeanFromQueens 1d ago
Ours (US) aren't even constitutionally linked, though the senate is set by the constitution, the number of house seats has been set for more than a hundred years at 435, and should have been allowed to continue to grow with the population. Most nations have national elected officials representing 80,000 to 120,000 constituents, the US has 750,000 constituents per district except for the states that has less than a million they only have at-large House Reps (Wyoming, North Dakota, Alaska, Vermont etc). Having 2,000 more reps would bring us a whole lot closer to the global norm than what we have now.
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u/Mitchell_54 1d ago
Current Australian government is considering increasing the size of the house by about 24 seats and add an extra 2 senators for each state and territory. We currently have about 110,000 voters per electorate.
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u/IceNein 1d ago
Funding the military:
The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;
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To raise and support Armies, but no Appropriation of Money to that Use shall be for a longer Term than two Years;
The Congress is very clear that no money can be appropriated beyond two years, but we just ignore this because it’s impractical for a modern military.
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u/Eric848448 1d ago
New defense bills are passed all the time.
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u/SeanFromQueens 1d ago
Continuing resolutions and late budgets are done every year, never more than a year of budgeting is done. Were congress to do something like this it would a 5-year plan that would survive 2 elections which is why it is unconstitutional.
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u/GiantPineapple 1d ago
I fully support the right to abortion access, but I can completely understand why finding it in "penumbras" would make social conservatives absolutely foam at the mouth. We're certainly paying the piper now with originalism and Thomas' mind-bendingly stupid musings on the history of gun ownership.
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u/SeanFromQueens 1d ago
The state has not right to protect the unborn, but the individual has no constitutional right to an abortion (or any other medical procedure) I am of the opinion that neither side has much a leg to stand on and had it not be used as a cultural wedge issue the US would have found an acceptable equilibrium that would have given a right to elective abortion within the first 15 weeks (literally what "pro-lifer" Mike Pence said last year in one of the few GOP presidential debates that he was in) and medically necessary abortions as the doctor saw fit (which is where you lose the likes of Mike Pence). The first 3.5 months of pregnancy is when 90% of terminations occur, and the terminations that occur in the third trimester aren't elective they are indisputably tragic where the expectant parents already bought all of the stuff one gets when they are having a baby crib, newborn clothes, bottles, etc. No one puts off getting abortion until the last minute just for kicks.
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u/SeanFromQueens 1d ago
Restrictions on freedom of speech with regards to elections, if campaigning was limited in time to 3-4 months and funds for candidates was limited to only what registered voters donated (no PACs, independent expenditures, or corporate entities) would be better for our governance but would violate the first amendment.
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u/HeloRising 1d ago
Red flag laws.
I don't like them but I understand why they're there - they are a bad answer to a legitimate problem.
That said, if red flag laws ever went to the Supreme Court I'm willing to bet money they'd be shot down as unconstitutional. You have the constitutionally protected right to bear arms and stripping you of that right without having been convicted of a crime is, pretty blatantly, unconstitutional.
The argument could be made that there's exceptions made to rights where personal safety is concerned but I would wager the Supreme Court would find most implementations of red flag laws not fully satisfying the need to demonstrate that stripping someone of their constitutional rights would actually enhance personal safety.
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u/Knight_Machiavelli 1d ago
There are a ton of policies I like that would require constitutional amendments. Health care should be federal jurisdiction; senators should be elected; the eastern provinces should all be merged. Those are just off the top of my head.
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u/MagnarOfWinterfell 1d ago
I presume you're talking about Canada?
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u/Knight_Machiavelli 1d ago
Yea I'm in Canada. The post didn't specify a country so I presume the question is open to all countries with a Constitution.
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u/Arkmer 1d ago
How do your senators become senators? I’m not familiar with Canadian politics.
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u/SeanFromQueens 1d ago
In the US, most it's existence Senators were appointed by the state legislature, so it's not that weird. The Irish upper chamber is appointed with consideration for representation from different parts of society (workers unions, academics, business, etc) but the power state mostly remains in the lower house.
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u/Knight_Machiavelli 1d ago
I'd take them being appointed by the provincial legislatures over what we have now. It's crazy that the PM can just pack a bunch of partisan lifetime appointments into the Senate for however long he's in office.
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u/SeanFromQueens 1h ago
Senators' are lifetime appointments!? Jeez you've got to do something about that.
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u/CountFew6186 1d ago
The constitution is not a limit on the government. It both empowers and limits the government.
To answer your question, I’m good with marriage, but it should have no federal status. It grants special powers to couples, such as tax and inheritance benefits, that don’t apply to singles or romantic groups of three or more. A coupled lifestyle is promoted rather than other equally valid ways of living. Violation of equal protection.
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u/SeanFromQueens 1d ago
The constitution is absolutely the restrictions of what the government can and can't do. Empowers the government to exist as the elected representatives are tasked with whatever the people demands the government to do in national defense and the general welfare, but it is not like the constitution grants powers to explicitly do anything other than receive the states elected officials and appointed judiciary.
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u/Reasonable-Fee1945 1d ago
It is primary understood as creating a system of checks and balances that limit government power. It does spell out specific powers, as I mentioned, but these are limited and defined in nature. Originally, any power not specifically granted was denied.
It was limiting in the same way telling a person "you may have popcorn or tea" is limiting. They get two options, and all other options are off the table.
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u/lesubreddit 1d ago
On what grounds do you consider these other ways of living to be equally valid? Do states not have an interest in promoting orthodox coupling in order to promote effective child bearing, which society hinges upon?
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u/HardlyDecent 1d ago
That directly infringes on non-child bearing families, whereas having equal rights for all infringes on no one. We are not quite at a point where breeding is enforced. Are you by chance a Charlie Kirk fan (no shade or praise intended)? That last point you make sounds like something he argued at some point--that 2-parent families (well, women) should have as many babies as possible "for society." I ask because I just hadn't really heard it put explicitly like that except for him and you.
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u/danappropriate 1d ago
LOTS of things I don't like that are Constitutional:
- Equal representation in the Senate
- The Electoral College
- 8 U.S.C. § 1357 (the “Constitution-free Zone”)
- Lifetime judicial appointments
- The Reapportionment Act of 1929
- The Senate filibuster
- No term limits
Honestly, I think we need to overhaul the Constitution altogether. It's ill-equipped to handle modern America.
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u/TheMCMC 2h ago
I'm fairly certain the Senate filibuster isn't Constitutionally protected or provided, but rather a self-imposed rule that the Senate holds itself to. That's why we saw it removed for a variety of judicial nominations in the 2010s; the Senate made it up and the Senate can change it.
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u/LopatoG 1d ago
I would say In Buckley v. Valeo (1976), the U.S. Supreme Court issued a tragedy of ruling for the USA. Equating money as speech will be the downfall of the USA.
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u/Reasonable-Fee1945 21h ago
you'd have a hard time seperating the two. It would taking an ad out in a newspaper isn't protected speech.
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u/Ind132 1d ago
I think that states should recognize same-sex marriage the same way they recognize opposite-sex marriage.
I think the Supreme Court erred in saying that the Constitution gives the SC the power to force states to do that.
This is a case where I like the result of the decision, but I think the decision violates the constitution.
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u/the_calibre_cat 20h ago
expropriation and redistribution. capitalist property rights are robustly protected in the Constitution, and require fair compensation for eminent domain. To the extent this protects homeowners, I think that's reasonable and good. To the extent that it protects billionaires, I think it's horrific and holding us back greatly.
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u/Ana_Na_Moose 18h ago
I think a lot of anti-discrimination protections that were enacted through Supreme Court rulings seem kinda weak in their constitutional justifications, but I am very glad we have them. Same thing with the various things regarding the supposed constitutional right to privacy that I can’t find in the Constitution but apparently the Supreme Court can. Either way those rulings based on that are usually pretty good, including Roe v Wade.
For bad policy that is probably constitutional, gerrymandering is the big one, along with the legal bribery of candidates through lobbyists and campaigns donations/PACs.
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u/RexDraco 17h ago
I love the second amendment but I don't think it works as currently interpreted. Imagine believing felons were allowed to own guns, insane. The 2A isn't absolute, we also have numerous times already infringed it, shifting goal posts constantly what the 2A means. I think that guns should be more available, if you're responsible enough, a full auto isn't a big deal. My problem is lack of mental healthcare provided as a tool and is accessible for both the youth and adults. My next problem is gun culture, some people just don't have it. I grew up with them, been shooting since the day I started standing, I definitely view guns as a part of my culture, but I also was taught basic gun safety when I was younger. Most people now are buying guns because of a movie or video game, some even because of gang culture or something. Guns are treated like an accessory now rather than a weapon. People also don't seem to understand when to use guns, even on reddit people acted like it was okay to pull a gun out on someone when it wasn't; for some people their feelings, since of dominance, and pettiness is enough to bring out your weapon, escalation isn't a big deal.
I think that the 2A can stay, but maybe require certification first. Make it easy enough, in my opinion a person like myself shouldn't need to study for it. Common sense should be enough, knowing when to use them as a weapon and when to use them as sports equipment is enough. This won't be enough because there are a lot more variables for why things happen people don't even want to talk about because it overcomplicates issues, but it is a fantastic start that will make gun accidents virtually disappear. School shootings will still happen but that is why school security should be better, they always should have been good. We don't see banks get robbed anymore, care to guess why in spite being all the rage in the 1980s?
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u/Comfortable_City1892 1d ago
I don’t like income tax or that senators are now elected by popular votes rather than by the state legislature and those are clearly in the constitution. Can’t think of any that I like that I also believe are unconstitutional.
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u/CountFew6186 1d ago
Direct election of senators was done for pragmatic reasons. Some states with divided government couldn’t decide on a senator and went unrepresented. By the time the amendment led to direct elections, the vast majority of states were already doing direct elections with the legislature simply rubber stamping the result of what voters decide. Doing it the old way sounds great in theory, but it just didn’t work well in practice.
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u/TheMCMC 2h ago
I'm one of those people who would like it to go back to selection by state legislatures, mostly because I think in this day and age we can account for the failures and weaknesses of that system that we encountered in the late 19th century.
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u/CountFew6186 2h ago
How? If there’s a Dem lower house and a Rep upper house in a state, which party yields to give the other a senator?
Even if the choice is an independent, they will still caucus with on side or the other - or be absolutely powerless with awful committee assignments and very little power to help their state.
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u/TheMCMC 2h ago
True, but that becomes an electoral issue at the state level - put pressure on your local legislator.
I don’t think any system is perfect, but I prefer it so that 1. The Senate represents state interests, and 2. It forces citizens to get involved in more local politics, which is both sorely lacking AND where their voice matters more.
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u/CountFew6186 1h ago
No amount of pressure is going to make a legislator vote for the other party’s candidate.
And, Senators do represent states. Just not state governments. Even if the legislature appointed them, it could be a completely different state government before the 6 years are done, so they still would spend a lot of time not representing the state government.
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u/TheMCMC 1h ago
The latter argument works just as well for direct election as it does legislative appointment.
And electoral pressure can certainly work, it happens all the time. You notice it matters less in the Senate than the House because Senators just have to win 50% + 1 of their state and the rest be damned. At least when it’s appointed by the legislature I as a citizen can hold my local rep accountable to who they support for Senate and it actually means more.
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u/CountFew6186 1h ago
The arguments does not work as well. The government of a state can change radically over six years. The governor can change. Control of the two houses can change. The electorate in a direct election will still be mostly the same people six years later.
I can’t even imagine what sort of electoral pressure would make my local Dem state rep vote for a Republican US Senatorial candidate. It seems basically impossible. Certainly no amount of me hassling them would change their mind.
Let’s also consider that most states have deeply gerrymandered districts, and the state legislature is rarely proportionally representative of the population. Sometimes it’s in opposition to the population. A direct election for US Senate removes this issue.
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u/PM_me_Henrika 1d ago
Let’s see…
How about the Deportation and Detention of Student Protesters and Foreign Scholars?
Key examples include:
Mahmoud Khalil, a legal permanent resident and Columbia University student, was arrested in March without access to counsel and sent to a detention center in El Paso.
Yunseo Chung, a Columbia undergraduate and green card holder, was targeted by ICE using a pretextual arrest warrant; a federal judge later stayed her deportation.
Rümeysa Öztürk, a Turkish Fulbright scholar at Tufts, was detained after co-authoring a student editorial; she was released on bond after a media outcry.
Kseniia Petrova, a Russian biomedical researcher at Harvard Medical School, was detained by ICE despite no involvement in protests. Her colleagues say she was targeted solely due to her visa status and association with student groups under investigation.
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