i'm now inclined to believe...

[acroyear]

...that though the problems of Senatorial life-long membership in the late 1800s were real, the 17th Amendment was not the best solution.  The senate today no longer represents the states and creates a forum where the states can argue their cases.  The senate is just another body representing the people, almost redundant to the House.

A senator can not accurately reflect the true concerns of his state's government if he is not of the same party and mind.  Today, when a state goverment has a grievance with the federal level, rather than have their appointed senator bring the issue up, they have to personally appear before the HOUSE to get the ball rolling.  This is not how it was designed.

Comments

[johnbroadfoot.livejournal.com]

A republican senator can not accurately reflect the true concerns of his state's government if he is not of the same party and mind.

Neither can a democrat.

[acroyear70.livejournal.com]

duh, my slip.

my brain was specifically thinking of George Allen, Republican from Virginia.

the "republican" word has been removed from the main post.

[johnbroadfoot.livejournal.com]

Good show my friend!

[rsteachout.livejournal.com]

I have said for years that the 17th amendment was bad for the nation, exactly for the reason you state: it takes the states' voice out of the national government. The original system was to be: House represents "the people", the Senate represents the states, the President is to represent all. (Also why I support the Electoral College procedure, even though it didn't work as initially planned after the first few elections: it requires the President to gain a coalition of different regions and states in order to actually win. Otherwise, anyone who carried California, New York, and Florida would win almost by default.)

Another effect of the 17th amendment is that there is less impediment to rampant federalization at the expense of states' rights. It wasn't until after the 17th amendment that we started getting huge federal "one size fits all" federal programs for everything, often with a requirement that the states foot the bill for large parts of the programs. (Yes, some things need a federal level to be consistent and most efficient; but not *every* blooming situation that comes down the track.) And the reason those programs are created so easily now is that there is no State voice to demand a thorough review of the proposal or to make sure that the funding mechanism doesn't require states to expend all their funds.

[acroyear70.livejournal.com]

the specific example that drove this post was the whole crapola about corporations asking congress to standardize the warning labels on food and remove from the states the right to impose additional warnings.

today, its an all-or-nothing that'll end up a total give-away to the corporations, by *both* parties (its not something they'll see worth arguing about and it'll keep a rich constituent happy).

had the 17th amendment not happened, the states' representatives in the senate could have argued for a best-of-breed where each can restate their reasons for the warnings they have.

under the current system, unless the *people* write to their congressman and senators, the states will have no say at all in what the feds decide to do as they take away yet another right of the state under the commerce clause.

[acroyear70.livejournal.com]

making matter worse are statements like this:

"Consumers across the country deserve a single set of science-based food warning requirements, not the confusing patchwork that we have today," said Rep. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn.

When a politician (either party - i'm not going to pick on the Reps exclusively this time ;-) ) says they thing something should be "science-based", as far as I'm concerned they're lying until they prove otherwise. Usually, "sound science" as used by politicians means evidence so overwhelming that the lawsuit has already been won - in other words, science proven not within the scientific community, but within the court of law - the only forum they understand besides media manipulation.