Amending the Constitution?

Heidi Mitchell, a writer in Connecticut, was published in the Thursday, July 2, 2026 issue of the Wall Street Journal. Apropos to the time, she asked five purported experts how they would change the Constitution and why. Her article is “Five Proposals for a More Perfect Union.” (page R14) Here is my analysis and comments to each.

1. Legislating Belongs to Congress. Professor Robert George of Princeton University would tighten up the Article I provision “ALL legislative power herein granted is vested in a Congress” (George’s emphasis). He complains that the President and judges have often legislated under the guise of executive orders or signing statements and judges do in similar manner interpreting the Constitution and statutes. George has a point. Both sides of the political spectrum have complained about the plethora of Presidential executive orders and agency regulations, as well as court opinions that offend their view. Administrative agencies should not be able to make rules that provide civil and or criminal penalties. The problem is how and where to draw the line. Both the President and the administrative commissions and agencies overstep their bounds from time to time. The Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) is hundreds of thousands pages. Navigating it can be a difficult task. And the courts should focus on the law and Constitution, not trendy sociological theories.

2. Term Limits for All. RJ Lyman of the Niskanen Center believes that the terms of members of Congress and Article III judges should be limited. Members of Congress too often act as if their main objective is to be re-elected, for life, perhaps. They can hardly be blamed; their perquisites are lavish. The 27th Amendment, which took 200 years to ratify, provides that “no law, varying the compensation for services of the Senators and Representatives, shall take effect, until an election of representatives shall have intervened.” That is not enough. All it really means is that they cannot give themselves a raise during the same session. Members of Congress should have to return to private life and live with their legislation. Lyman suggests two terms for the Senate and six for the House. I could agree with that. Age limits are arbitrary and should not be imposed. Temporal limits might not work for judges. Their tenure “during good behavior” was written into Article III to limit the influence of current political and social trends on judicial acts. While the common law has evolved over time, there is often a fine line between interpretation and legislation, and political pressure on courts should be restrained as much as possible.

3. Farewell, Electoral College. Matt Bennett of The Third Way (an advocacy organization that claims to champion moderate center-left and political ideas) wants the Electoral College scrapped because it is undemocratic. That is a thoroughly bad idea. A nationwide popular vote for President and Vice-President would advantage demagogues and further diminish federalism. Federalism, political power divided between the federal government and the states, as well as separation of powers in the federal, is part of the genius of our Constitution. The several states, are just that; they are sovereign except where the Constitution specifically delegates powers to Congress and the President. The prior commentator, BJ Lyman, in meeting an objection to term limits as anti-democratic, pointed out that no one since Aristotle has believed that unfettered democracy was a good idea outside small communities. A majority of persons in the body politic can be as despotic toward minorities as a monarch or dictator. One of the best analyses of why popular election of the President is a bad idea is Tara Ross’ Enlightened Democracy, the Case for the Electoral College (2004).

4. Rethink the First Amendment. Jay Swanson of the Brennan Center for Justice complains mainly about the cases like Citizens United that prevent states from limiting the power of wealthy persons to influence election. Well, free speech is free speech. No question that there is lot of political advertising on every medium by PACs and other organizations, from both sides of the aisle and along the political spectrum. This demonstrates that the answer to speech one doesn’t like is more speech from another point of view. The right complains about George Soros; the left complains about the Koch brothers (now Charles Koch since David died in 2019).

5. Equal Gender Rights. New York University professor Melissa Murray wishes to “enshrine gender equality” in the Constitution. Gender? Although the concept of “gender” vis a vis sex, had been limited to grammar before the arrival of our brave new world (with such people in it). I suppose it now means roles of sexes, and identity, whatever that means, along with pronouns. Professor Murray never uses the word sex in her essay, so it is difficult to believe it is other than a sop to the trans-sexual (excuse me, gender) proponents’ movement which, biological science shows is nonsense. One might describe it as an idiocy rather than an ideology. The Fourteenth and Nineteenth Amendments, enforced by appropriate Congressional legislation, gives both sexes equal rights under law. A separate “equal rights Amendment” is vague enough to be interpreted as to prevent Congress and states from outlawing mutilation of children and require public funding for adults in their attempts to realize their fantasies.

Conclusion

Whether these proposals, or any part of each, could be accomplished is doubtful, at least for the foreseeable future. Amending the U. S. Constitution is political heavy-lifting. Two-thirds of each House of Congress and ratification by three-fourths of the states is required. That is unobtainable in the present political climate. It is anybody’s guess what the future situation might be.