"The Supreme Court has reconstituted itself as a permanent constitutional convention, amending the Constitution at will to suit the ideology of the majority." --Don Feder, FrontPageMag.com 7/6/05

The alternative amendment method provided in the Constitution (Article V) is to adopt specific Amendments by ratification of three fourths of the states (after proposal by 2/3 majorities of both Houses of Congress). That process is dangerous as well and that's why the Founders made it difficult to make changes. They understood runaway passions and the need for sober deliberation.

Look what has happened with the addition of the illegal (not properly ratified) Fourteenth Amendment, and the change in our balanced power distribution by the passage of the Seventeenth Amendment, which places the election of U. S. Senators in the very largest populated cities in each state, virtually eliminating the people of the vast majority of the geography in the state, and more importantly, stripping the needed and necessary powers of the state legislatures and giving them instead to the big city political machines and moneyed special interests.

The income taxes Lincoln pushed through Congress during the War for Southern Independence were not legal and were overturned after the war. The income tax was proposed in the Sixteenth Amendment supposedly to enable tariff reform and maintain required revenue.

Those who supported ratification of the Sixteenth Amendment legalizing (?? -- was it legal? ??) the income tax could not have imagined the volume and complexity of today's federal tax code. In 1913, it was proposed as a low flat percentage payable by only the very wealthy. Only incomes greater than $3,000 per year had to file and pay the one percent tax; the average worker made $520 per year. Now, we can clearly see that the Sixteenth Amendment enabled modern tax slavery.

The poor judgment of the 18th Amendment (Prohibition) is self-evident. It was repealed by the 21st Amendment. But at least wisdom prevailed on that issue; we're still saddled with the fallout from the 14th, 16th and 17th Amendments. These will be addressed in more detail later; for now, suffice it to say that history proves that constitutional amendments are dangerous despite their slow and deliberate nature. A Con Con could completely pervert or erase the Constitution and do so in a relative instant--- like the bang ending a game of Russian Roulette.

Runaway partisan passions and long-term frustration threaten our form of government and its defining charter with a con con. Combine that with threats to our economic foundation---made worse by irresponsibly excessive taxation, debt and deficit spending--- and we may have the "perfect storm" that threatens to tip America into a violent crisis.

With looming economic chaos, as has already been shown in Europe, we're in for a rough ride. So far, proposed American solutions seem to be "more government" meaning more spending and borrowing, much of which is headed down the same rat hole of corruption by the business elite and politicians of both parties that cater to the wishes of special interests with the taxpaying public ignored or trampled ---other measures are simply delaying the painful reckoning with past folly. FDR's "new deal" in the 1930s only made economic problems worse and delayed recovery. The bailouts of 2009 will only make matters worse.

The Founders wisely provided for us various measures to fire those who oppress or threaten us and to check their power-grabs. Unfortunately, crisis distracts normally vigilant patriots and provides cover for power-grabbers. Desperation and fear from a world wide crisis enable tyrants and usurpers to grab unauthorized powers, powers they never surrender when the crisis passes.

Lincoln's abuses are well documented. Woodrow Wilson expanded government broadly during World War I. FDR greatly expanded government powers during the Great Depression and even more during World War II. But following the crisis, the central government didn't recede to its pre-crisis levels.

The Declaration of Independence declares it our right and duty to alter or abolish governments that fail to protect our God-given rights including property rights--the ownership of our labor. We did just that in the first American Revolution and we came pretty close in the Second one---a struggle postponed to a later date. The old saw that the price of Liberty is eternal vigilance suggests that the struggle to get---and keep--- liberty never ends. Our current government is clearly way outside its original bounds. What do we do about it?

"The principle for which we contend is bound to reassert itself, though it may be at another time and in another form." ---Jefferson Davis

"Though written constitutions may be violated in moments of passion or delusion, yet they furnish a text to which those who are watchful may again rally and recall the people. They fix, too, for the people the principles of their political creed." ---Thomas Jefferson