Posted by
CKHustler on Sunday, March 15, 2009 10:43:24 PM
The Senate Continued
For the Independent Journal.
HAMILTON OR MADISON
Federalist Paper #63
"Responsibility, in order to be reasonable, must be limited to objects
within the power of the responsible party, and in order to be
effectual, must relate to operations of that power"
Say limited to within the Constitution? I will just make a quick note here as it gets repetitious, but their powers are limited to the Constitution! How often they stray from that commitment!
"And yet it is evident that an assembly elected for so short a term as
to be unable to provide more than one or two links in a chain of
measures, on which the general welfare may essentially depend, ought
not to be answerable for the final result"
And yet those failed policies of the 60's are still haunting us to this day! It seems that those in our current congress are no longer a single link or two in the chain, but are a chain unto themselves! 40 years in the Senate?! They ought to be answerable after that long and well before that in my opinion. When a policy turns south and is obviously a failure, why leave it in there to suck away our money. The lies coming from the democrats keep them firmly in place. If they are so worried about the poor, why do conservatives give more to charity than liberals? Why is Obama reducing tax deductions on charitable giving? Why does Biden give less than 1% of his income to charities? I find it funny how conservatives are always the "selfish" ones, yet we give way more in charity. What a load...
"that such an institution may be sometimes necessary as a defense to the
people against their own temporary errors and delusions."
Here is where I think it necessary to keep the senate a representation of the state instead of the people of the state. The people will still indirectly control them by electing those of the state representatives, but with a link in the middle, it changes the dynamics and acts as Hamilton says here. I mentioned this yesterday I think.
"or misled by the artful misrepresentations of interested men, may call
for measures which they themselves will afterwards be the most ready to
lament and condemn."
It almost makes me want to start singing about Obama eh? I feel this will definitely happen and the backlash of the people being fooled will be powerful. We shall see.
"the danger will be evidently greater where the whole legislative trust
is lodged in the hands of one body of men, than where the concurrence
of separate and dissimilar bodies is required in every public act."
Here he just restates why I think the states should appoint the senators. Though all at least indirectly elected by the people, it is important to have at least one house not directly elected by them so as not to be swayed on a whim of the people.
"Before such a revolution can be effected, the Senate, it is to be
observed, must in the first place corrupt itself; must next corrupt the
State legislatures; must then corrupt the House of Representatives; and
must finally corrupt the people at large."
This does lay it out nicely. On the contrary, if the people elect every one of those institutions then all that is needed is the sly tonque of men to get their way. That may happen in the HoR here, but the senate is a different task. With enough honest men in the state legislatures, they will appoint honest men to the senate. Really one way or the other, if the people get fooled, all is lost, but with the senate being appointed by the states, it will take a bit longer for it to reach the senate if it originates with the people.
I would like to point out how he formed his arguments. First he started with conjectures then used history to prove his point and then again came back to his conjectures for the final point. Using history as he did in this paper is very tough to argue against as he didn't just bring up one example, but multiple examples that correlated precisely to what was being written. It takes lots of research, but it pays off in the long haul.
"All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing" Edmund Burke