Broken But Unbowed by Greg Abbott

Author:Greg Abbott [Abbott, Greg]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Threshold Editions
Published: 2016-05-16T22:00:00+00:00

I KNOW WE CAN

* * *

Lastly, many naysayers argue that trying to amend the Constitution is a waste of time because it’s too hard to do. To the contrary, all it takes is one person with backbone. It could be you.

In 1982, as a sophomore at my alma mater the University of Texas, Gregory Watson was preparing a research paper for a government class. While searching for a topic for his paper, Watson stumbled upon an amendment that Congress had passed but which had not been ratified by the United States.

Watson was fascinated with the proposed amendment and wrote his paper on how it could be ratified and urged its adoption. His teacher was unimpressed and gave him a C.

Undeterred, Watson persisted. By now this issue was far larger to Watson than any paper or any grade. It was a cause. He took upon himself the cause to try to get the amendment ratified.

Watson began a letter-writing campaign to state legislatures across the country requesting states ratify the proposed amendment. This was long before Twitter and Facebook.

The challenge was daunting for one monumental reason. Congress passed the proposed amendment in 1789, almost two hundred years before Watson wrote his research paper.

There was another immovable obstacle. Law professors, politicians, and pundits agreed that there was no chance to resurrect a proposed constitutional amendment that was almost two centuries old.

But Watson was no law professor, politician, or pundit. He was an American citizen. Watson pressed on.

By now, he had captured the attention of a force more powerful than the established class. He had gained the support of the people of the United States.

A big reason was the subject of the amendment: congressional pay. In the midst of public backlash against Congress in the 1980s, Watson latched on to a topic that resonated with the people.

As congressional salaries increased, and as Congress’s power expanded, public anger with Congress exploded. The public was all too eager to pass a law that Congress wouldn’t pass itself: a law reining in Congress.

As proposed by James Madison in 1789, the amendment read:

No law, varying the compensation for the services of the Senators and Representatives, shall take effect, until an election of Representatives shall have intervened.

Unlike what became the Bill of Rights, Madison’s amendment to congressional pay never received enough votes to be ratified. By 1791 only six states had ratified the amendment. So it largely languished for the better part of two centuries.

Between the time Madison left the amendment and Watson picked it up, three more states had ratified it.

Slowly but surely, Watson was able to get one state, then another, to ratify the amendment. First it was Maine, then Colorado. Ten, then twenty, then thirty-seven states ratified it. On May 7, 1992, Michigan became the thirty-eighth state to ratify the amendment.

The naysayers were wrong because they didn’t understand the effect that a single person with backbone can have in our country.

Watson’s college research paper for which he received a C turned into the Twenty-Seventh Amendment to the Constitution.

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