Likely Success of Article Five Convention Efforts

You have to want this enough to call or write or tweet or text your own, local statehouse representatives. That’s the bottom line.

But one piece of good news is that your local representative is, in most states, a genuinely local person, not some permanent resident of D.C. who claims to represent you. Someone from your community or town, perhaps. So this isn’t as tough as getting an appointment with your US Congress Member. If you get together with a few like-minded citizens in your district and make an appointment, you will probably get a decent amount of time to speak with your representative in person.

…to Call Your State Rep!

For those who prefer joining a group instead of doing the work solo, please visit the ConventionOfStates website, and get a copy of their free handbook on how to participate. You can also sign up to volunteer for a specific activity at their website.

Another bit of very good news about this effort is that it won’t cost you a lot of money or time. The expense of a phone call or letter is your main investment. If you choose to get involved, it’s up to you how much time you spend. Every letter helps, so if that’s all you can afford to do, it’s still of great importance.

Easy, inexpensive, and not very time consuming. Few political efforts can make that claim.

But here’s the most important good news of all: The Article Five Process is not politics as usual. The American people are disgusted with politics today, perhaps more than ever before (and anyone who’s looked back over the history of politics knows that’s saying a lot). Politics as usual today involves manipulations by the media and the propagandists, the interference by feckless party leaders and election fraudsters, and totalitarian abuses by lawless executives who deploy the power of government against individuals.

Because it’s not politics as usual, your voice counts more than it does in most other political matters. This is why this effort has a chance to succeed: “they” can’t stop you.

One last note here: If you’re interested in how states pass these Article Five Resolutions, ConventionOfStates has a decent decription for you. Bonus: Schoolhouse rock!

The first answer is that people are seriously fed up with what we have now, and know we must do things differently. We’ll get into the state demographics in a little while, but what this means is that the Article Five effort has a strong chance of success because of The People. The main reason for that claim is that the vast majority of Americans are disgusted at the rapidity of decline of our nation under the past two presidents, even if they don’t understand why the decline happened, or who is responsible. This fact is shown by the following graphic from Gallup:

Clearly…Something Is Wrong

We The People are searching for a solution, and have seen that both Republicans and Democrats have failed to provide it.

Couple that failure with the horrendous opinions people have on Congress in general, and the President’s low approval numbers (despite having the media firmly in his back pocket), and you can tell that Americans are fairly certain the solution will NOT be coming from inside the District of Columbia.

Thus, asking everyone to work on a solution coming from the Several States is not as difficult a proposition as many critics maintain.

But the second answer to the question of “Can we count on the states to do this?” is:

What Other Choice Do We Have?

Think about it. Not only do we all know things are headed in the wrong direction, but most of us worry that the probable economic decline we face will be worse than any in American experience. This creates pressure on politicians to find or create a scapegoat. The tools of the professional “scapegoat creators” are always the same: class and cultural divisions based on fear of “the other.” They use the media and their political speech to focus the people on a target group on which they hang the blame.

Campus anti-semitism is on the rise

This is why the recent increase in anti-semitism is not an accident— Especially on the University campus.

Further, as documented here at TheRightScoop, Conservative Christians have been added to the target list. These articles show worldwide murder and violence against Christians, but the anti-Christian hatred is also institutionalized in America, and it’s going to get worse as the economy declines.

But while this targeting alone tends to increase the likelihood of violence, it’s not only targeting that causes populations to head into protracted, physical conflict. The targeted groups are The Excuse for atrocities. And here is where those of us who are pushing hard for Restoration meet our initial resistance from the left and from the Progressive Republicans: “Atrocities? What atrocities?” they ask.

But we did mention “demographics” above, so just a few quick things to touch on here. First, a roundup over at Gallup regarding the ratio of Conservative to Liberal populations among the states. This is about the citizenry of each state, and not explicitly about the makeup of the state legislatures, so bear that in mind while watching:

Unstated above is that more states, overall, are conservative than are liberal (good maps at that link, BTW). This explains why more states have Republican governors and Republican controlled legislatures. This will be of some help in convincing your legislator to vote for an Application Resolution. Note also that you could swing a cat every day, all over D.C., and never hit a Conservative once.

The second item is a bit strange to include, since at first, it seems at odds with what we know about America’s conservative populace, but I’ll leave it to ‘fess Jacobson to explain it:

Legal Insurrection: Liberal self-identification surges! (up 1 pt since 2008)

Jacobson breaks it down for you, but the takeaway for us is that despite the fact that Democrats continue to shift leftward (which they deny with great emphasis, while no one believes it), Conservatives haven’t shifted at all, and Independents are shifting rightward.

Given those demographics, this is a great time to be working this issue, since conservatives tend to be more engaged with the importance of Restoring the Constitution. People will listen, even through their fears, because we all know something must be done, and it will never be done by the Federal government.

The first bit of good news here is that many state legislators feel they have little choice but to take up this Great Work of our generation. They see increasing Federal mandates for which their state cannot meet the burden. They see Federal control being exerted over state sovereign territory. They see a federal judiciary declaring state constitutional provisions and laws to be null and void. They see a loss of their individual power as legislators, as the distant federal bureaucracies and congressional committees take more and more power—in direct contravention of the Ninth and Tenth Amendments.

No doubt many state legislators are quite happy with things as they are. But the only ones truly happy with things are the select few who hold power in each state. The average legislator in “flyover country” is someone who wishes they could do more for their state, but feels greatly restricted. These are the ones that need to hear from you.

However, partisan fears and demagoguery can only stand so long against the undeniable fact of a long train of abuses and usurpations. (You can’t hide the collapse, you can only try to make it sound fun!)

The next bit of good news about the states is that this process is entirely under the control of the state legislatures. Not the Governors, not Congress, not the President, and not the courts. As such, this is their fight, and several states have taken up the challenge already. State legislatures that have gotten out in front on this effort are:

Consider that your progress report for this week. I’ll visit it again in a few weeks or so, now that I have the initial research done and the table built.

Just you and me, my friends. We can’t help the Low Information Voters.

Please take time to update your state’s legislators at the ArticleFiveProcess scoreboard. The failures of a few early Application Resolutions (see the table, above) are simply the very earliest attempts in this long process. Once more states get on board, the other states will begin to feel the heat.

The same is true of state legislators. Keep contacting them, and please keep updating their status on the ArticleFiveProcess scoreboard. As the map heats up, so will the legislative activity. Remember: they can’t stop you!