Additional Material on the Founding Fathers

Several people have asked about more material on the Framers.  There are numerous books available and many individual biographies of the more popular members of the Constitutional Convention.  Below are a few interesting references that provide more details than appear in this blog but are much more concise than the books.


William Pierce, one of the Framers, wrote a short biographical sketch of the others.  His sketchs, together with other interesting materials, are available at:

http://www.usconstitution.net/constframe.html

A different and interesting perspective of some of these men as citizen soldiers is provided by the U. S. Army Center for Military History at:

http://www.history.army.mil/books/RevWar/ss/ss-fm.htm

A geographically oriented description of these individuals, excerpted from Carol Berkin's book, A Brilliant Solution: Inventing the American Constitution, is available at:

http://constitutioncenter.org/ncc_edu_Founders.aspx

Summary of Tax Plan

At this time, more people have read Abraham Baldwin's discussion of taxes than any other of this blog's entries.  Given the changes over the last 200+ years it is likely that Baldwin would recognize the need for taxes other than import and export duties, but it is also likely that the complexity and inherently bureaucratic structure of today's tax system would be appalling to him.  The tax plan below is a summary of what he might have proposed if he was willing to accept the notion of taxes at all. 


INDIVIDUAL INCOME TAXES


1) Income taxes are paid by employers on their employees at a flat rate with no deductions. No individual is required to file an income tax return.
2) Citizen employees, regardless of income level, are returned a single payment monthly including the following:
     a) a sum equal to the flat tax rate applied to the current poverty level, plus
     b) other government payments to individuals such as social security, disability, unemployment, etc., plus
     c) any incentives the Congress deems desirable, for example, a homeowner incentive, a child care incentive, or other.
3) No government payments or incentives are paid to non-citizens whether or not taxes have been collected on their earnings.
4) Unearned income of individuals is not taxed.
5) The flat tax rate may be changed by Congress but changes do not take effect for four years from the date the new rate is established


CORPORATE INCOME TAXES


1) U.S. industries producing tangible products that have a continuing market after first sale pay no income taxes on the portion of the earnings from producing such products
2) Industries, such as service industries, producing other than tangible products (as described above) pay taxes on earnings at a flat rate with no deductions
3) Industries headquartered or based outside the U.S. are taxed at the flat rate regardless of the type of product they produce

Proposed 37th Amendment -- Support for States

Any majority of States may direct the Federal government to perform any function deemed desirable by those states, provided:
1) the function is not precluded by the US Constitution
2) the entire cost of the function (for all States) is borne by the States directing the Federal government to perform the function
3) the State Executives, with approval of their legislatures, will be the deciding authorities for requesting such functions. 

Proposed 36th Amendment -- Term Limits

No person may serve more than a single term in any elected office within the Federal government.  Persons may serve in multiple elected offices such as one term as Representative and one term as Vice-President.
Representatives shall be elected for a term of four years with one-fourth of the representatives elected each year.

Proposed 35th Amendment -- District Boundaries

Congressional district boundaries are to be chosen so that States are divided into the appropriate number of districts, each with the same population, minimizing the sum of the perimeter of all the districts.

Proposed 34th Amendment -- Constitutional Convention

During the course of the calendar year of each one-hundred year anniversary of the original ratification of this Constitution, a Constitutional Convention shall be convened.  Members of the Constitutional Convention shall consist of the senior sitting Senators of each State, the Supreme Court Justices, and the Vice President of the United States who will act as Chairperson of the Convention.  No other person shall be privy to or present at the Convention.  The Constitutional Convention shall propose any amendments approved by two-thirds of Convention members for ratification by a normal ratification process.  During the course of the Convention, all members will be sequestered and have no outside contact with any person, entity, or external information source.  Votes taken at the Convention shall only be subsequently reported as passing or failing without identifying individual votes.

Proposed 33rd Amendment -- Service

Every citizen shall complete two years of National service between the ages of 18 and 50.  Such service may consist of working for any Federal government entity or any State or Local government entity approved by Congress.  Full-time uncompensated volunteer work for a qualified non-profit organization will also qualify. This service is a condition of citizenship and will result in loss of citizenship if not completed by the age of 50.  This Amendment applies to anyone who has not reached the age of fifteen at the time of ratification.  The Congress shall assure that opportunities for such service are available to all citizens.

Proposed 32nd Amendment -- Information

The Executive shall gather and provide to all Citizens all available information to inform their decisions about their lives, businesses, and other interests.  Personally identifiable and national security information is excepted but these exceptions should only be used with great care.

Proposed 31st Amendment -- Responsible Contracts

Government entities contracting with other government or non-government entities shall be responsible for assuring timely and financially sound execution of such contracts.  Should, during the period of the contract, the cost estimate for completion of the contract ever exceed the originally agreed upon price by more than 15%, the contract shall be immediately terminated and the original performing entity shall deliver all completed work and shall not be allowed to provide any additional item(s) included in the contract at time of termination.

Proposed 30th Amendment -- Debt

Within any thirty year period, starting with ratification of this Amendment and again each time the debt reaches zero, the Nation’s debt shall be zero at least one time.  The President and the Congress shall budget to assure this occurs.

Should the thirty year period expire without a zero debt occurring, Congress may not create any new budget line items and each existing line item's budget will be reduce by 5% in the next year.  This will continue each year until zero debt is achieved.

Proposed 29th Amendment -- Line Items

Prior to passage of legislation, any member of the House of Representatives may demand a separate vote by that body on any separable (line item) portion of the proposed legislation.  If such vote results in the item in question receiving less than a majority of a quorum it shall be stricken from the Bill.

Proposed 28th Amendment -- Legislation

Each law passed by the Congress shall have the following characteristics:   
1. An expiration date of not more than ten years in the future shall be included in the legislation
2. Regardless of the expiration date, at time of passage the anticipated lifetime financial impact of the law shall become a firm budget commitment for future budgets unless or until the legislation and associated financial commitments are subsequently repealed
3. All costs associated with the law shall be borne by the nation rather than States, local governments, or individuals

Amending the Constitution

A series of Amendments to the U.S. Constitution, hopefully reflecting the intent of the Founding Fathers, will be included in the next series of these blogs.  The rationale behind these proposed amendments is included in the previous discussions by some of the Founding Fathers.  Note that many of these amendments are not meant to stand alone but rather to work in conjunction with each other.  Also note that many items suggested in the previous discussions are not reflected because they do not require amending the Constitution.


The first ten amendments, The Bill of Rights, provide for rights of liberty and property for the people and the States.  James Madison introduced these ten amendments (and two others) at the 1st Congress.  They were meant to correct deficiencies in the original Constitution.  The proposed  ten amendments described in following articles are meant to correct operational deficiencies in the way the Federal Government operates by establishing an incentive structure that will lead to Government behavior more consistent with the intent of the Founding Fathers.

George Mason Speaks on Gerrymandering

“As a professional politician from Virginia, the largest State in my time, I have an appreciation for the value of Gerrymandering and might have wished to employ it during my tenure.  However, I believe my record of having refused to sign the Constitution because it did not include a Bill of Rights makes it clear that fairness and justice are clear values of mine.

I was amazed at the extent to which the boundaries of Congressional districts are manipulated to assure a particular party can win the district.  For example, North Carolina’s 12^th Congressional District, shown above, has the characteristics of extreme gerrymandering.  But not as extreme as Illinois’ 4^th Congressional district which is so severely gerrymandered that it almost appears to be two districts rather than one.  Such manipulation of the populace is contrary to all the principles upon which this Nation was founded.

Since allowing arbitrary selection of Congressional districts obviously results in manipulation by the group in power to remain in power, and since this practice results in perversion of the objectives  in the founding of the nation, a solution must be found.

  

A formula for drawing district boundaries that would provide appropriate representation would have been difficult if not impossible until the advent of computers.  Today it is quite simple to define such a formula and an appropriate one is to choose the districts so each contains equal population and so that the sum of the perimeter of all the districts is a minimum.