Why Comey's Firing Is The Third "Constitutional Crisis" In A Year

After Donald Trump fired James Comey, and then had the temerity to admit in an interview that it was, as everyone suspected, to end the Russia inquiry, there's been a lot of talk of a "constitutional crisis. I laugh a bit at this, not because I deny the seriousness of of Trump's action, but because we have been in crisis mode for quite some time.

The first such crisis came last spring when the Republican Senate refused to even consider president Obama's pick for Supreme Court justice, effectively treating him as illegitimate. The second crisis came after the election, when the candidate who lost by millions of votes was allowed to become president. The Supreme Court battle was a case of the Constitution being ignored, the election was a case where the Constitution appeared to be at odds with its intended purposes. And now, of course, we have a crisis where the chief executive is behaving like an autocrat, but his Republican allies are unwilling to provide a check on his power.

At base in all of these cases the issue is that one of our political parties is merely the vehicle for an extremist ideology that will stop at nothing to grab political power by any means necessary. This ideology is also not supported by a majority of Americans, which is why this party suppresses the vote, gerrymanders, harnesses gushers of dark money, and puts its support behind a nationalist demagogue who promises "jobs" while passing all the cuts to taxes and health care that they want.

Anyone who fails to understand the true nature of the Republican party fails to understand the current political reality. Those "objective" journalists who portray it as just another center-right political party are wrong, as are the radicals on the Left who treat them as one side of the neoliberal coin, with the Democrats on the other. It is not fear mongering to say that the Republican party as currently constituted poses a threat to the existence of constitutional democracy in this country, it's the truth. Democrats, radicals, and journalists all need to be acting under this assumption. Our three constitutional crises in the past year ought to be proof enough.

Our Endangered, Outmoded Constitution

Chile had constitutional rule for 140 years before 1973. There's no reason an American constitutional crisis couldn't have a similar ending

Americans like to brag about having kept with the same constitution since 1787, a world record by far in terms of written constitutions.  I've long thought this was a problem, since the American Constitution was drawn up before there had been other examples of modern republics to draw from.  It was also drawn up with the assumption that political parties would not be powerful forces in American political life and with the express intention of thwarting popular will.  The electoral college meant to put the vote  for president in the hands of the "right sort" of propertied man.  The federal system gave each state equal representation in the Senate, before a proliferation of low-population states made that body completely undemocratic.  That same Senate is allowed to make its own rules, rules that allow minorities to block votes with ease and even individual Senators to put a "hold" on an appointment without even providing a reason.  We have now reached a point of constitutional dysfunction that a Supreme Court justice can die and the Senate majority leader can proclaim that he has no intention of even considering the president's appointment, and he just might be able to get away with it.

This pronouncement comes after years of blocked judicial appointments and legislative gridlock.  Our system of government simply isn't functioning properly.  It's also completely schizophrenic.  The principle of "one person-one vote" is part of our judicial system, but when it comes to the Senate, Wyoming gets the same representation as California.  Despite its obsolescence, we still use the Electoral College which can, as in 2000, give the presidency to the candidate with fewer votes.  It also nakedly violates the principle of one person-one vote.

These have been endemic issues for a long time.  In recent weeks, the failures of our constitutional system have been put in high relief by the Republican Senate's apparent desire not to vote on any candidate that president Obama nominates for the Supreme Court.  This is an unprecedented move, and one that our dysfunctional system allows for.  In fact, while this case is getting attention, most people are unaware that the Senate has consistently been blocking Obama's nominees to lower courts as well.  Our higher courts are going unstaffed because an outmoded constitution assumes that such a thing would never happen.  When it was written, these kinds of partisan issues were never expected to be part of the task of appointing judges.  But guess what, they are.

Keeping our 18th century Constitution has also led to massive distortions in what rights our citizens have.  Because of the very ill-worded 2nd Amendment, owning an assault rifle has become an inviolable right.  But due to the 18th century values of the Constitution, education and health care are NOT things that the people have a right to, which is insane.  Compare this to Germany, whose Basic Law written after World War II guarantees rights to health care, education, and equal rights to both men and women.  (In America the ERA failed to get ratified in the 1970s.)

As a nation we sing hosannas to the legal millstone around our collective neck.  Of course, there is no real way forward.  A constitutional convention in this day and age would be impossible considering the depth of political division.  There is no way to compromise between a libertarian and social democratic vision of society.  The states have become so ingrained in our mental and physical maps that there is no erasing them or our ridiculously confused federal system.  The only thing to do is sit back and watch the current fatally flawed system be manipulated and gamed, until one day the whole thing just collapses.

Make no mistake, when the collapse comes it will be at the hands of radical conservatives.  They have shown a propensity for proclaiming their love of the constitution all while thinking that the ends always justify the means when it comes to accomplishing their goals.  They are rabid true believers who feel that they are "saving" the country, and thus can do whatever needs to be done. In the last twenty years we've already seen an impeachment over a BJ, a stolen election, multiple government shutdown hostage situations, restrictions on voting rights, unprecedented use of the filibuster, and now refusing to act on any Supreme Court nominee.  I'm beginning to think that the ultimate day of reckoning is coming sooner rather than later.  The history of the Americas is littered with examples of rightist reactionaries suspending constitutions in order destroy their leftist opponents.  Let's not pretend that the same thing can't happen here.

New Constitutional Amendments I'd Like to See (But Probably Never Will)

Since the election, I have been amazed at how little has changed.  The president won, but he still seems to be playing defense, and is having to face a nomination fight over Chuck Hagel, who's a bloody Republican, for crying out loud.  Gridlock almost let the austerity bomb go off, and now it seems that Republicans are gunning for another debt ceiling hostage crisis.  Much needed hurricane aid for the northeast has been stalled, and Congress seems to have little interest in making itself better than head lice and genital warts in the public esteem.

Many of these problems have to do with the way that our Constitution allows the system to be manipulated.  It's totally unlikely that we will ever come up with a new Constitution, so the only way to make the system work better would be through Constitutional amendments.  Considering the 75% threshold of states needed combined with our divided political system, that won't happen anytime soon. Still, here are some rather common-sensical amendments I'd like to see, some of which apply to gridlock, and others to deeper issues.

Abolish the electoral college
The electoral college is an embarrassing white elephant, a relic from the Founders' suspicion of the people.  It enables candidates who lose the popular vote to win the election, and makes voters living in heavily red or blue states irrelevant.  The president would now be selected by the popular vote, and if no one candidate receives a majority of votes cast, a run-off between the top two vote-getters would be required.

Uniform voter registration
I find it rather insane that we have national elections, but individual states determine who gets to vote in them.  Thus some states ban all former criminals from voting, and use voter ID laws to suppress turnout.  I would like to see an amendment creating uniform voter qualifications, and ones that do not require ID.  I would be fine with such an amendment forbidding prisoners on felony charges from voting, but not one that would take away their votes for life.

Repeal the second amendment
The current interpretation of this amendment makes meaningful gun control legislation difficult to obtain.  Add to that the fact that the original amendment is ambiguously worded (it gives the right to bear arms to "the people" rather than to individual citizens.)  We are losing tens of thousands of people to gun violence each year, and need to have ways to seriously address the problem.  The 2nd Amendment was written by people who lived in a world of muskets; it has long outlived its original intent.

End Congress' control of the debt ceiling
Some claim that a proper interpretation of the 14th Amendment holds that Congress can't control the debt ceiling anyway, due to a clause saying that the debt of the United States can't be "questioned."  Congress gets to vote on the budget, which makes the debt ceiling redundant, and only useful as a tool for holding the public hostage.  These hostage crises threaten the nation's credit rating and serve no good purpose.

Increase the number of representatives in the House
The nation's population has reached three hundred million, but we still have the same number of representatives in the House as we did when the country was less than a third as populous as it is now.  House reps are more distant from their constituents than ever, and with larger districts gerrymandering is that much easier.  With smaller districts citizens will be able to better influence their representatives and have their voices listened to.

House districting put in the hands of non-partisan judicial panels
As mentioned before, gerrymandering is out of hand.  In the last election Democratic candidates for the House out-polled Republicans in the nationwide total, but the Republicans still won the House by a comfortable margin.  That would still be a shame in my eyes if the parties were reversed.

End corporate personhood
The pernicious doctrine of corporate personhood is one of the most malodorous legal fictions ever farted out by the judiciary.  It has given even more power to this nation's real rulers, allowed them to manipulate the political system, and to oppress their employees.  Ending corporate personhood is a common-sense idea whose time has come.

Equal Rights Amendment
Let's end on a positive note, shall we?  When I teach my students about the ERA and Phyllis Schlafly's successful push to keep it from passing, they are usually flabbergasted that such a common-sense amendment was defeated.  It's high time we brought it back, and this time the ERA should also include provisions banning discrimination on the basis of sexuality, as well as on gender.