Thread: Constitutional Issues (Moved Posts)

I don't have any historical foundation for a state electing house members simply based upon a statewide election as opposed to districting but I do believe that it did exist early in American history. Obviously there's been a problem with gerrymandering which is inherent when politicans are the ones creating Congressional districts. This problem is actually becoming worse today because analysis of voting is much easier with computers.

As for why eliminating Congressional districts would increase the likelihood of third party candidates it's a matter of simple logic. If we have ten Congressional seats and three parties we assume ten members of both the Republican and Democratic party to be running. Each party wants all of the seats. There is going to be one favorite Democrat and one favorite Republican and perhaps only one third party candidate. These three candidates are going to receive the vast majority of the votes from their party members. The favorite third party candidate is probably going to receive more votes than the lessor members of the D's & R's because they will receive almost unanimous support from their party members. The third party candidate's vote isn't going to be split and will almost always exceed the vote for the lessor D's & R's. This would bring diversity to the House which is obviously missing today.

Once agian the key is that the US Constitution leaves the matter of voting for House members to the State legislature (so long as it's a popular vote) just as it leaves the matter of selecting Electorial College members to the State legislature (and no popular vote is required).

There is not now nor has there ever been a Constitutional requirement for a popular vote for the president. In one sense I'd like to see the popular vote for president eliminated completely. It's turned into a partisan popularity contest where the voters are generally unininformed related to the candidates.

Originally Posted by DivineComedy

Those are good questions.

Forgive me for editing the post down to this but trying to address the issues item by item becomes problemantic.

Here are some points to consider.

First of all while we can debate whether the term United States refers to the Government of the United States or to the all of the Individual States being addressed as a whole or in part I believe there is ample evidence of both based upon context.

What we can't argue is the clearly estabalished fact that the Constitution is very specific and when it refers to the United States it is not referring to the People, Persons or Citizens as those "words" have specific definitions and usage in the Constitution. This is where "progressive" interpretations of the Constitution fail. Article I Section 8 states that the US government is to "provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States" and it does not state "provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the People of the United States." The interests of the States, which under State Constitutions do have delegated roles and responsibilities related to providing for the general Welfare of the People, is different than what is required to provide for the general Welfare of the States themselves. Providing for common coinage and standard weights and measure benefits the States as prior to the US Constitution each State had it's own coinage and created it's own standards of weigths and measure. This provision benefited all of the States as it relieved them of responsibilities that often conflicted with other States.

Congress, under Article I Section 8 is limited to defining "naturalization" and a person born in Puetro Rico is not a natural born citizen (citizenship established BY birth) of the United States. Congress does not have that authority, period. Congress can, by naturalization, make them a native born citizen (citizenship established AT birth), Regardless of Congressional opinion, John McCain was a "native born" citizen based upon the naturalization laws passed by Congress but was never a "natural born" citizen because he was born in Panama and not the United States. John McCain was a "natural born" citizen of Panama and a "native born" citizen of the United States. A person cannot be a "natural born" citizen of two different countries. Barack Obama, on the other hand, was a natural born citizen of the United States but could also have been a native born citizen of Britain because his father was British. He never applied for native born citizenship in Britian but he could have at age 21 as I understand it.

One point, if Pueto Rico becomes an independent nation (which I advocate) then the People of Puerto Rico are all Puerto Rico citizens and not US citizens. Additionally they would lose any "social security" benefits that they've been paying for through taxes if, indeed, those taxes are being collected. The United States does not own Puerto Rico but merely has adminstrative control over it.

One point, we're not discussing the acts of Congress but instead the Constitution.

Hey, gotta run. Things to do and people to see but I'll be back for more.

Originally Posted by Shiva_TD

I don't have any historical foundation for a state electing house members simply based upon a statewide election as opposed to districting but I do believe that it did exist early in American history.

It did. I rechecked my last post and Georgia did use that method heavily prior to the Civil War, so I left my mistatement because I was not alive then.

I am not so sure Newt would have been a representative if Zig Zag Zell's State had that old constitutional plan of electing representatives. It was under Zig Zag Zell that the Democrats tried to gerrymander Newt out by watering down John Lewis's district; the writ I sent was arguing that John Lewis's district had no comparable issues to the more rural district of Newt.

Gerrymandering would evaporate, but due to race issues I think the method is dead in the water even if it appears the constitution does not specifically support districts.

Text
We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence,[note 1] promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

Meaning and application
The Preamble serves solely as an introduction, and does not assign powers to the federal government,[1] nor does it provide specific limitations on government action. Due to the Preamble's limited nature, no court has ever used it as a decisive factor in case adjudication,[2] except as regards frivolous litigation.[3]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Preambl...s_Constitution

By way of example the United States (government) provided for the general Welfare of the United States (all individual States) by establishing time zones predominately for railroads under the "commerce clause" of Article I Section 8.

Shiva, just a comment on some of your discussion with 'Devine' which is somewhat interesting. The meanings of "provide" and "promote" had distinctive differences in those days to those of today, but nowhere at any time was the purpose of the Federal to provide for the General Welfare. As for DST, here is a good article on the concept, adding only that today States are charged with what is used, Arizona for instance never changes times.

The idea of daylight saving time was first conceived by Benjamin Franklin in 1784 during his stay in Paris. He published an essay titled “An Economical Project for Diminishing the Cost of Light” that proposed to economize the use of candles by rising earlier to make use of the morning sunlight.

http://www.timeanddate.com/time/dst/history.html

Originally Posted by jackson33

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Preambl...s_Constitution

Shiva, just a comment on some of your discussion with 'Devine' which is somewhat interesting. The meanings of "provide" and "promote" had distinctive differences in those days to those of today, but nowhere at any time was the purpose of the Federal to provide for the General Welfare. As for DST, here is a good article on the concept, adding only that today States are charged with what is used, Arizona for instance never changes times.

http://www.timeanddate.com/time/dst/history.html

The preamble, as noted, is an introductory statement outlining that which is contained in a document and inherently carries no weight as the specifics are addressed within the document.

Article I Section 8 is specific though as it specifically identifies through it's enumerated powers that which the Congress is delegated to do to "provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United State." If we look at the "enumerated powers" in Article I Section 8 we see that they fall into three categories. They either addresss national defense, providing for the welfare of the nation, or are adminstrative to achieve either "providing for the common Defence or general Welfare of the United States." As I have pointed out to "progressives" is that the listing of enumerated "powers" that provide for the general Welfare of the United States would make no sense if the Congress could do whatever it wanted in this regard. The list becomes moot if Congress can first define anything it wants in what provides for the "general Welfare" and then mandate it under the law. The Constitution states what the States had agreed to as far as providing for the "general Welfare" and only the States can make that decision. Of course the Supreme Court has ruled against my position on this but it was a split decision and I agree with the minority opinion of the Court.