Restoring ‘Diversity’ To The Supreme Court
This article originally appeared in the Daily Caller. Liberals talk a great deal about “diversity” these days, so it is ironic that so many have lined up in favor of President Barack Obama’s pick for the Supreme Court, Merrick Garland. On important measures, Garland would render the Court less diverse than it is now. One […]
Report on the Constitutionality of the “Compact for America” Plan Expanded
The Article V Information Center has updated and expanded Rob Natelson’s report on the constitutionality of the “Compact for America” (CFA) plan to amend the Constitution. The original report found that the CFA plan suffered from serious constitutional defects, and that it was unlikely to survive judicial challenge. After it was issued, Rob received […]
What the 1777 Georgia Constitution Tells Us About the Article V Convention Process
When interpreting a legal document, you often can get clues from looking at any predecessors to the document. For example, what did earlier drafts say? What did previous documents that served as models provide? Did the framers of the final version mirror earlier wording, or did they change it? If a phrase in an earlier […]
Masters v. School District Number 1
The Independence Institute has long been a champion of tenure reform, local control, and flexibility in the realm of school and district personnel decisions. In 2010, the Institute was part of a broad, bipartisan coalition supporting Senate Bill 191, Colorado’s teacher evaluation and tenure reform bill. It continues to defend SB 191’s critical reforms from both […]
The 4th Edition of Prof. Natelson’s Article V Treatise Is Now Here!!
In 2014 the first legal treatise ever on the Constitution’s amendment process was published: Prof. Rob Natelson’s work, State Initiation of Constitutional Amendments: A Guide for Lawyers and Legislative Drafters. The work was commissioned by the Convention of States Project of Citizens for Self Governance. Over the past two years, the treatise has undergone updating and expansion. […]
Cruz Withdrawal Postpones “Natural Born” Issue
This article first appeared in the Forth Worth Star Telegram. A silver lining to the withdrawal of Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, from the presidential race is that we will be spared a battle over whether he met the Constitution’s requirement the president be a “natural born citizen.” The evidence is not all one way, but […]
Is the “Compact for America” Procedure to Amend the Constitution Constitutional?—An Update
Because of widespread interest in the Article V Information Center’s report on the legality of the “Compact for America” approach to amending the Constitution, we are reprinting it here. Distilled to its essence, the “Compact” approach is unconstitutional because it seeks to change, through state legislative action (statutes and interstate compacts), the amendment procedure specified in […]
Newly-Published Ratification Documents Confirm Our Conclusions on the Amendment Process
The Wisconsin Historical Society publishes successive volumes of the Documentary History of the Constitution of the United States. As its name indicates, the Documentary History is a multi-volume set of books containing documents from the debates over the Constitution’s ratification. The Wisconsin Historical Society published fairly recently two volumes from the debates in Maryland. There […]
Ranking the Presidents Using CONSTITUTIONAL Factors Rather than Liberal Politics
This article was first published by CNSNews. In an earlier post, I pointed out that the usual academic rankings of presidents are flawed. They are flawed because they rely on criteria not in the Constitution’s job description for the president. As a result, academic rankings consistently overrate liberal activist presidents and underrate those who conscientiously […]
Measuring Good and Bad Presidents: Why Academic Historians Are Wrong
This article was first posted at CNS News. I recently watched an academic panel on C-SPAN devoted to “The Worst Presidents In American History.” It was sponsored by the Organization of American Historians. As is true of so many academic panels today, it was “diverse” in the sense that the participants were of different races […]
Is the “Compact for America” Plan to Amend the Constitution Constitutional? Unfortunately not.
II’s Article V Information Center has just issued a law report concluding that the “Compact for America” approach to amending the Constitution is, unfortunately, almost wholly unconstitutional.
New Article on What “Taxes” Are (And Aren’t) Under the Constitution, and the Implications for Obamacare
Was the Supreme Court right to call Obamacare’s insurance penalty a “tax?”
