This video is sponsored in part by Typesy
I’m Mr. Beat, and I’m in love In love with the United States Constitution.
It’s like my favorite constitution ever, seriously. However, it’s not perfect, because things
change, man. Sure, people mostly stay the same, but the technology changes, the culture
changes, our knowledge collectively changes.
The Founding Fathers, or dudes who debated and created the U.S. Constitution in the early
years of the republic, knew this. They knew that over the years, the Constitution would
have to be amended, or changed, to reflect a changing country. Thomas Jefferson once
even wrote to his buddy, James Madison “Every constitution then, and every law, naturally
expires at the end of 19 years.”
And those first ten changes came quickly. Just three and a half years after the Founders
ratified the original Constitution, they ratified the first ten changes, commonly referred to
today as the Bill of Rights. This was to get those pesky Anti-Federalists on board with
the rest of the Constitution.
The states ratified the 11th Amendment four years later, the 12th Amendment, nine years
after that. However, it took another 61 years to be amended after that. The 13th, 14th,
and 15th Amendments, also known as the Reconstruction Amendments, were all passed during a crazy
time of reform right after the Civil War. After the 15th Amendment, 16th Amendment didn’t
come until 43 years later, during another crazy time of reform known as The Progressive
Era. The last Progressive Era amendment was the 19th Amendment, ratified in 1920. Since
then, in the last 100 years, only eight additional amendments have been ratified. The states
ratified the most recent amendment way back in 1992, and that was for an amendment first
proposed way back in 1789.
So why is it so freaking difficult to amend the Constitution? Well, we can blame
the Founders.
The Founders wanted it to be
difficult to amend so that the government
was more stable and to lock in their great ideals, you know. They also didn’t trust
the masses much, and wanted to make sure it was something that was REALLY important before
it altered their beloved document. Hence, it’s only been changed 27 times.
But there have been some unintended consequences to making the Constitution difficult to change.
You see, now we often rely a lot on the Supreme Court to just interpret the Constitution differently
to push reform forward. I don’t think most of the Founders saw that one coming.
But say we are about to enter a time of dramatic reform. Maybe we are? Who knows? Well just
in case, here are my top 10 proposed Constitutional Amendments. Think of it as my Amendment wish list.
I’ve been thinking about this for a while, but that doesn’t mean this list is any good.
It’s basically me just having fun.
#10 The right of citizens of the United States, who are sixteen years of age or older, to
vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of
age. Yep, you know it. I want to lower the voting
age to 16. 16- and 17-year olds often work and pay federal income taxes, and they’re
also legally allowed to drive and can be tried as adults if they commit crimes. Plus, there
are plenty of 16- and 17-year olds who know much more about government and politics than
those 18 and older. In fact, I’d argue that the 16- and 17-year olds of today are smarter
than at any other time in American history. Let them have a say.
And if you think 16 is too young for the vote, what makes 18 old enough, huh?
#9 Congress cannot make any laws that apply to American citizens that don’t apply equally
to themselves. (and vice versa) This seems like common sense, and you’re
likely surprised right now to hear that this is not already part of the Constitution. Well
it’s not. One example of this is that, up until 1984, members of Congress didn’t have
to pay Social Security taxes.
The next one is an actual proposed Amendment almost ratified in the 1970s, known as the
Equal Rights Amendment, or ERA, and, I'm just gonna read it word for word here.
#8 "Section 1. Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the
United States or by any State on account of sex.
"Sec. 2. The Congress shall have the power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the
provisions of this article. "Sec. 3. This amendment shall take effect
two years after the date of ratification." A big reason why it didn’t pass is because
folks worried that women would lose special privileges, like not getting drafted to fight
in a war, but I say those special privileges be expanded to everyone dad gomit. Is the
ERA really needed when laws and the courts have mostly done a good job fighting for women’s
rights? I say yes, because just because you don’t see discrimination against women now,
doesn’t mean you won’t see it in the future. Oh, and one more thing. You DO see discrimination against
women now...a lot of times it’s just more under the radar. And look, more rights for
women doesn’t mean less rights for men.
And here is another actual proposed Amendment nicknamed the Saving American
Democracy Amendment...I’m also just going to read it word for word here:
#7 Section 1. The rights protected by the Constitution of the United States are the
rights of natural persons and do not extend to for-profit corporations, limited liability
companies, or other private entities established for business purposes or to promote business
interests under the laws of any state, the United States, or any foreign state.
Section 2. Such corporate and other private entities established under law are subject
to regulation by the people through the legislative process so long as such regulations are consistent
with the powers of Congress and the States and do not limit the freedom of the press.
Section 3. Such corporate and other private entities shall be prohibited from making contributions
or expenditures in any election of any candidate for public office or the vote upon any ballot
measure submitted to the people. Section 4. Congress and the States shall have
the power to regulate and set limits on all election contributions and expenditures, including
a candidate’s own spending, and to authorize the establishment of political committees
to receive, spend, and publicly disclose the sources of those contributions and expenditures.
This is essentially a response to the Citizens United v. FEC Supreme Court decision, which
reaffirmed corporate personhood and made it easier for organizations to spend lots and
lots of money on political campaigns. Well, as one of my YouTube viewers wrote “if corporations
are people then they should be able to receive the death penalty.” Oh snap! I agree. Corporations
have way too much power over elections in this country.
For my 6th favorite proposed amendment, I put it in multiples of sixes.
#6 Term Limits for Congress and the Supreme Court. U.S. Representatives can’t serve
more than 12 years. U.S. Senators can’t serve more than 18 years, and Supreme Court
justices can’t serve more than 24 years. U.S. Representatives also serve four-year terms,
with election years being the non-presidential election years.
This opposed to two so that they’re not constantly running for re-election and could
actually focus on...I don't know...legislation? Look, I get that term limits are not perfect,
and you know more term limits might cause lobbyists to have even more power and influence in DC. However, I think most of us are just
tired of career politicians and this is the best way to fight that.
#5 Amendments become part of the Constitution when ratified by the Legislatures of two thirds
of the states, or by conventions in two thirds thereof.
So basically, this is just making it easier to amend the Constitution. It’d still be
2/3 of Congress or state conventions to propose amendments, but I want to change it from 3/4
to 2/3 of the state legislatures to be required to ratify them. Currently, that means just
33 states instead of 38. As I explained at the beginning of this video, it’s currently
really difficult to change the Constitution, which makes no sense as
the world is changing.
#4 The Electoral College will no longer pick the President. American citizens will directly
elect the President.
Now, at the state level there could be additional reforms, like implementing ranked choice voting,
approval voting, or score voting. I’m still for federalism here. Let the states still
run their own elections. However, count every vote. One person, one vote. And if you think
I’m naive about the importance of the Electoral College, you are sadly mistaken. Check out
my video here where I take down the antiquated Electoral College.
My top three proposed Amendments...collectively as a compromise because they do go together
quite well if I don’t mind saying so myself which I just did.
#3 The seventeenth article of amendment to the Constitution of the United States is hereby
repealed. Yep, get rid of the direct election of U.S.
Senators and return the power of appointing senators to state legislatures. Now hold up,
hear me out! There is little evidence that proves that the 17th Amendment did anything
to reduce corruption in both the U.S. Senate and in U.S. Senate elections. Plus, this is
an appeal to conservatives who want to revive constitutional federalism and limit the growth
of the federal government. Because guess what comes next?
#2 The U.S. House of Representatives will have 930 members. Congress may increase the
House membership after every U.S. Census to account for population growth.
Currently the number is 435, so this would more than double the current size of the House,
and of course would also make it so that there would be 1,033 electoral votes, assuming the
Electoral College still existed. I know this sounds radical, but you just gotta
remember that when the republic first started, each member of the House represented 30,000
citizens. Today, each House member represents an average of 747,000 citizens. How can one
person truly represent that many freaking people? I mean, we’ve had the same number
of Representatives since the 1920s. Since then, the country has grown by 208 million
people! Now, if Congress wanted to just pass a law
to make this happen, they could. The Constitution does not have to be amended to make this happen.
However, I think that this is important enough that it needs to be added to the Constitution.
Oh, and you might be where I’m getting that 930 number? I just pulled it out of thin air.
Just kidding, it came from this article by Chris Wilson, which I’ve linked in the description
of this video. In the article, Wilson uses math to limit disparity in representation
using a basic standard deviation. I kind of know what that means, but the bottom line
is 930 ends up being the magic number to make sure that each representative is representing
around the same amount of people. One big bonus for increasing the representatives in
the House is that it would make gerrymandering more difficult. Speaking of which...
#1 The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by
the United States or by any State on account of political beliefs.
I know that probably sounds familiar since it’s basically the 15th amendment but replacing
the words race, color, or previous condition of servitude with “political beliefs.”
Since the Supreme Court has already established precedents for racial gerrymandering but pretty
much said oh no we can't do anything about political gerrymandering, I feel this amendment is the best way we can actually fight to
make elections more truly representative.
So there you have it. My wish list for 10 Amendments to be added to the Constitution.
There are others I considered but I just thought weren’t fleshed out well enough yet. Which
ones do YOU think should be added?
Let me know in the comments, eh?
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So if you liked any of these please send this to your representatives in Congress...or maybe your state representatives….or maybe your grandma and grandpa...or your grandma and grandpa’s son or daughters. Or their sons and daughters brothers or sisters. And their brothers and sisters cousins. And their cousins therapists. And their therapists dentists. And there therapists dentists.
Basically, what I'm trying to say is just sent this to everybody you ever interact with again everyday for the rest of your life. Got it? Gooood.
But anyway yeah so today is my birthday, so I figured why not put this little birthday list together.
Seriously though, if you disagree with any of my proposed amendments, I do want to hear from you because
it's always a work in progress. We can all together make this country....good...again.
If you don't like any of my constitutional amendments, just ignore them or you can comment below and tell me that
I don’t know what I’m talking about. Happy birthday to me, indeed. Thanks for watching!