>Can't do it, though. According to the divinely inspired Constitution,
^^^^^^^
errrr where has anyone made this claim?
>the
>Senate can only be altered or abolished with the unanimous consent of the
>states. As Article V says, "no State, without its Consent, shall be
>deprived of its equal Suffrage in the Senate." Funny, I thought suffrage
>applied to people, not states.
back then, it *did* apply to states. state's were a body politic, an entity unto themselves, represented in the senate by two senators--that's why that ruling btw. wheras the house represented "the people." if you'll recall, they were building a constitution uniting what were once 13 sovreign states that felt they at all the rights to self determination as those in the Balkan regions do today.
madison surely was fearful of a majorty faction of the rabble, as was he fearful of powerful minority religious factions gaining power. his penchant for algorithmic and an agonistic procedural solutions as a check against factions was, too, part of the reason for such devices.
begs the question though: presumably we'd face quite the same issue were we to ever find ourselves at the threshold of that groovy globalized socialist future. particularly acute, this question, given issues of national sovreignty raised by current crises. i think it quite worth working through, these concerns over local v. central power. it's not altogether clear to me that centralization is the only or best answer.
kelley
Q: Are you an academic? Q: Who says? Q: And that's enough for you, is it?