Does Article V Restrict the States to Calling Unlimited Conventions Only?—A Letter to a Colleague

From time to time, various state legislatures have adopted resolutions designed to require Congress to call a limited convention in which one or another possible amendments to the Constitution might be proposed. In 1967, thirty-two states, two short of the requisite two-thirds filed such resolutions requesting a convention for the purpose of considering an amendment to overrule the Supreme Court\u27s principal reapportionment decisions. In 1971, Senator Ervin of North Carolina introduced a bill to provide guidelines to be followed upon a state call for a convention. This year, approximately twenty-eight states have adopted some kind of resolution for the purpose of considering an amendment to impose fiscal restraint upon the federal government-to require a balanced budget. Curiously, the convention mode of proposing amendments remains completely untested- no such convention has ever been assembled. Yet the amending convention obviously is contemplated by article V of the Constitution: The Congress, whenever two thirds of both Houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose Amendments to this Constitution, or, on the Application of the Legislatures of two thirds of the several States, shall call a Convention for proposing Amendments, which, in either case, shall be valid to all Intents and Purposes, as part of this Constitution, when ratfied by the Legislatures of three fourths of the several States, or by Conventions in three fourths thereof, as the one or the other Mode of Ratfication may be proposed by the Congress .... Several scholars, including Professors Charles L. Black, Jr. and Bruce A. Ackerman, both of Yale Law School, have argued that unless the state legislative resolution reflects a desire to convoke a constitutional convention having the authority to propose an unlimited variety of fundamental changes in the Constitution, Congress should treat the state resolution as a nullity. Recently, Professor Ackerman sent Professor Van Alstyne a reprint of his New Republic editorial and asked Professor Van Alstyne whether he had any thoughts on this. The following is Professor Van Alsyne\u27s reply

The concept of property and the takings clause

Leif Wenar examines the impact on takings scholarship of the redefinition of "property" early in the twentieth century. He argues that the Hohfeldian characterization of property as rights (instead of as tangible things) forced major scholars such as Michelman, Sax, and Epstein into extreme interpretations of the Takings Clause. This extremism is unnecessary, however, since the original objections to the idea that "property is things" are mistaken

\u3cem\u3eRonald V. Dellums v. George Bush\u3c/em\u3e (D.D.C. 1990): Memorandum \u3cem\u3eAmicus Curiae\u3c/em\u3e of Law Professors

This joint memorandum is submitted to the court hearing Dellums v. Bush. This amicus brief advocates that the President may not order American armed forces to make war without consultation with and approval by Congress. The brief also argues that the case is justiciable

Direct democracy and constitutional change: institutional learning from state laboratories in the USA

Although the federal constitutional amendment procedure in Article V of the U.S. Constitution has not been altered since its adoption 226 years ago, constitutional tradition in the 50 states has substantially evolved. For instance, popular referenda were unknown in 1787, but are now ubiquitous in state constitutionalism. Over time, a strong tradition of direct democracy and majoritarian voting rules has emerged in almost all states. Nevertheless, scholars have often neglected the rich source of state experiments with amendment procedures in the U.S. and usually only refer to Switzerland as the prime example of direct democracy and (constitutional) referenda

Introductory Remarks: The Relationship of Law and Morality in Respect to Constitutional Law

This article explores the consequences of a Constitution not entirely aligned with moral law. These remarks encourage all legal minds to acknowledge such gaps when they are found, although there are a variety of ways in which such acknowledgment may take shape

The Puzzle of Environmental Politics

In this report we study estimation of time-delays in linear dynamical systems with additive noise. Estimating time-delays is a common engineering problem, e.g. in automatic control, system identification and signal processing. The purpose with this work is to test and evaluate a certain class of methods for time-delay estimation, especially with automatic control applications in mind. Particularly interesting it is to determine the best method. Is one method best in all situations or should different methods be used for different situations? The tested class of methods consists essentially of thresholding the cross correlation between the output and input signals. This is a very common method for time-delay estimation. The methods are tested and evaluated experimentally with the aid of simulations and plots of RMS error, bias and confidence intervals. The results are: The methods often miss to detect because the threshold is too high. The threshold has nevertheless been selected to give the best result. All methods over-estimate the time-delay. Nearly the whole RMS error is due to the bias. None of the tested methods is always best. Which method is best depends on the system and what is done when missing detections. Some form of averaging of the cross correlation, e.g. integration to step response or CUSUM, is advantageous. Fast systems are easiest. White noise input signal is easiest and steps is hardest. The RMS-errors are high in average (approximately greater than 6 sampling intervals). The error is lower for fast system or for high SNR