e domestic institutions thereof, including that of persons held to labor or service by the laws of said State.[NOTE: In 1865 the states ratified Amendment XIII which is exactly what the Congress of 1861 wanted to prohibit.]
1926 - Child Labor. Still open. [Gives Congress the power to regulate child labor. It DID NOT get ratified but Congress never lets technicalities stand in its way. It regulates child labor anyway, and the Supreme Court, which has seldom been hampered by the WORDS of the Constitution, has made numerous rulings on the subject without considering the legality of the underlying question.]
1971 - Equal Rights - Women (ERA). Expired after one extension. [All 12 women who supported this abomination are still upset. Here is the whole proposal:
"Section 1. Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex."
Can't you just see a woman, 8 months pregnant, running across a battlefield in full field pack? How about the woman who demands to play in the National Football League? Rework the words ladies, and it will sail right through. But the real question is, who needs it? Equality is already guaranteed, but without the "MUST DO IT" implications. If enforcement of existing law is the problem, go after that.]
1978 - District of Columbia - To Vote Like States. Expired after 7 years. [This proposal (often called the Jesse Jackson amendment) was intended to add two PERMANENT Democrats to the Senate and one PERMANENT Democrat to the House. If this plan had worked the idea was to do the same thing with Puerto Rico, Guam, American Samoa and the Virgin Islands. That would have added ten PERMANENT Democrats in the Senate and five PERMANENT Democrats in the House. We oppose the addition of any new states as long as California remains a single state.
Of course, the whole subject of amendments is silly. No one pays any attention anyway. Congress does whatever it wishes and the Supreme Court does whatever it wishes. Even the subject of taxes has been rendered moot. To raise money, the states' Attorneys General now join with the U.S. Department of Justice to sue industry for whatever they can extract (tobacco was the test case to develop the procedures, now comes guns, next will come automobiles, then tires, fertilizer companies, chemicals, housing and furniture for using wood, etc.). Congress likes this system better than the "pass a law" routine because now they get the money and everybody blames the lawyers. The lawyers don't mind because they are not elected anyway. Companies now flee the U.S., placing heavier burdens on those that stay and this will become a vicious cycle. That's the price of government without rules; a country with a living Constitution. . . changing with the wind.
The notion of a living constitution is the most evil of all ideas... a euphemism for lawlessness. This is the verbiage embraced by those (lawyers, historians, politicians, and judges) who wish to take advantage of others. No fair minded person could ever endorse such blathering nonsense. The founders intended to produce a static document... why else provide a mechanism for change?
Applying today's "principles" of government and considering the public's deep seated apathy, MOST of the 17 Amendments beyond the Bill of Rights are totally unnecessary. Except for freedom for slaves and voting AGES, all of the rest are useless. If the XVI (income tax) did not already exist, it would still be permitted by the Supreme Court without review (under the "commerce clause.") If the XVII (direct election of Senators) did not exist, Congress would force the states to modify their election procedures to do it anyway and the Supreme court would declare it a political question.
A lasting constitution MUST be ABSOLUTE. The law of the land. No exceptions, even when it hurts.
That's what the Founding Fathers had in mind when the Constitution was written. To a person, the founders lamented the lousy document they had put together, but to a man they understood the absolute necessity of such STANDARDS