Our American democracy is the greatest experiment in governing in the history of the world. But no experiment is ever perfect. The Founders acknowledged that our government would always need improvement.
We are at a moment where far too many Americans, especially among the young, have lost faith in our government. It seems to many Americans that our government serves itself, rather than the People.
The Solution
We have proven in the past that we can adapt to the changing times and be more responsive to the needs of our citizens by amending the Constitution. Past amendments ended slavery and established equal protection under the law, while giving women and 18 year olds the right to vote.
We are at another such moment. We need to restore the People's faith in the great American experiment by getting the People more directly engaged in their government, and making their government more responsive to the People.
Unfortunately our amendment system is not working as it should. The Founders' plan was to share the proposal power between Congress and the state legislatures, so they could check and balance each other, and to let the People weigh in on ratification, to maintain a strong connection between the People and the Constitution.
We have lost that balance, with Congress exerting far too much control at the expense of state legislatures and citizen input. Congress currently has all the power to propose amendments, with state legislatures effectively disenfranchised. And the People have been effectively disenfranchised from ratification.
State legislatures have been called the “laboratories of democracy." They are essential to how we govern as a nation. They represent the People in important ways that Congress cannot match. They need a workable way to propose amendments. And our citizens need to be involved in changing our Constitution.
How To Do It
We should update the Constitution so that the state legislatures can propose amendments when two thirds of them agree on identical language, while keeping Congress' current ability to propose amendments. We should give the People the ability to ratify any proposed amendment in a referendum. And concurrent with the People's power to ratify, we should let the state legislatures ratify proposals from Congress, and let Congress ratify proposals from the state legislatures.
We can ensure that there are proper guardrails against imprudent amendments by requiring a referendum of the People to win two thirds of all votes cast nationally, plus majorities of the votes in two thirds of the states.
These changes would strengthen our representative democracy by making Congress and the state legislatures equal partners in proposing and ratifying amendments, while adding an important measure of direct democracy.
This would restore faith in our government by invigorating the amendment process and bringing our great Constitution back in line with the People.
Who We Are
We are a coalition of conservatives, progressives and moderates. We disagree on many political issues, but we all agree that the rules for amending the Constitution need to be updated.