Over a period of decades, there have been political candidates and politicians that have campaigned at the federal level that have promised that if they were elected into office that they would “reform Washington,” only to discover that it is they who are reformed by going native, succumbing the D.C. culture and its way of doing things. It has become increasingly clear that if reform is going to take place, it would have to come through the people and through their elected representatives in the state legislatures in all fifty states. Under Article V of the U.S. Constitution, with the help of two-thirds of the states, a convention can be called for the purposes of introducing new amendments to the Constitution. Three-fourths of the states would be required to ratify them. If one state can get the ball rolling, I believe that other states would follow.
What amendments would I like to see proposed? I would like to see an amendment setting term limits for members of Congress. I would like to see an amendment repealing the seventeenth amendment and have Senators chosen by their state legislatures and not by direct election, giving states more say in Washington, just to name two.
Now there will be those voices that will claim that if a convention is to take place that there would be the possibility that it would run away. It will not. Safeguards will be in place that only the amendments proposed will be considered and nothing else. They safety valve is there.
Would this process take a long while? Perhaps. If it is to save this republic and give more power to the people, however, then it is well worth it. After all, it is the people in the U.S. who rule and not the elites in Washington, D.C.