Twenty-seven times in our country’s history amendments have been made to the U.S. Constitution. They’re often made to address issues that weren’t foreseen by the Founding Fathers as they were writing the original document.
It’s highly unlikely the Founding Fathers could have predicted the explosion of money in politics and the ever-expanding amount spent on campaign financing each election cycle.
It’s even less likely they would have foreseen Supreme Court decisions like Citizens United, which opened the floodgates for the influx of money into political campaigns.
But whether or not the forefathers had any premonitions of the sort, the current reality is that money continues to assert a disproportionate amount of influence over our electoral process.
And research has found that many of the issues in our country are due to that influence and the ability of money to buy access to our nation’s leaders.
So what’s the solution?
Reversing the damage that has been done by the US Supreme Court around campaign finance reform will require a constitutional amendment, because the US Constitution is the only authority above the Supreme Court.
Article V of the U.S. Constitution outlines two ways to propose an Amendment:
- Two-thirds of each house of Congress can vote to propose an amendment, or
- Two-thirds of the states (34 states) can pass a resolution that calls for a national convention to propose an amendment.
Whichever of the two methods are used, the amendment then goes back to the states for ratification.
Ratification requires three-fourths of the states to vote in support of an amendment before it becomes part of the Constitution, ensuring that it must have broad public support from the American people.
Many people are unaware that more than half of the 27 amendments were preceded by calls for an Article V Convention, including the Bill of Rights.
Historically, pressure from the states has been an important check against the federal government, and an effective way to get Congress to act.
Leading the charge for an Article V Convention is Wolf-PAC.
Wolf-PAC is a cross-partisan, nonprofit political organization founded for a single purpose: to address the disproportionate influence of money in our political system through an Article V Convention.
They’ve built an organization with over 400,000 volunteers and supporters, passed resolutions in five states, and gained the support of hundreds of legislators from both sides of the political aisle in less than five years.
While a constitutional amendment won’t fix everything that ails our government, it is an important step in moving our country toward elections that are free of the corrupting influence of money in our political system, and fair enough that any citizen can run for public office.
Wolf-PAC has set up state chapters, and Wolf-PAC Colorado has support from over 20 State House Reps and just under a dozen State Senators, and those numbers are increasing.
The chapter looks forward to Colorado becoming the next state to pass the Free and Fair Election Resolution.
WolfPAC is a proud member of the coalition of reform organizations behind "Unrig the System," an event aimed at reforming Colorado politics. Find out more by watching the video below or by visiting unrig.it.
Photo Credit: isak55 / Shutterstock.com
