"Miller on a New Constitution"

Unlike previous drafts with the same title, this one's not calling for the imposition of Shari'a Canon Law, with the local Ordinary having full power (potestas) to take stern measures against all instances of genocide, murder, theft, adultery, non-annulled divorces, artificial forms of contraception, Sabbath-breaking, non-alphabetically-arranged CD collections, fathers who procreate before paying off their house mortgage, excessively-bright sunlight, and fools who fail in their ignorance to acknowledge that Velvet Underground was the greatest frakkin' band the Seventies ever produced.

Although I do note that this particular Lesser Miller does want the new "Supreme Law of the United States" to outlaw abortion, so he's one-tenth of the way there.

http://lsolum.typepad.com/legaltheory/2006/08/miller_on_a_new.html

August 31, 2006

Miller on a New Constitution

Jeremy M. Miller (Chapman University - School of Law) has posted It's Time For A New U.S. Constitution < http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=926550> (Southern University Law Review, Vol. 17, pp. 208, 1987) on SSRN. Here is the abstract:

In late 1985, two United States Supreme Court Justices took the unprecedented step of publicly stating that the intent of the Framers of the Constitution was of decreasing importance in interpreting that document. Justice Brennan limned, it is [a]rrogance clothed as humility to pretend . . . we can gauge accurately, the intent of the Framers. Perhaps the celebration surrounding the bicentennial of the Constitution should be tempered with a re-evaluation.

Since the adoption of the Constitution in 1787, there has been no Constitutional Convention other than the one which created the document, though there have been several amendments. A convention shall be called by Congress if it is requested via application of the legislatures of two-thirds of the states, pursuant to Article V of the present Constitution. Although approximately thirty states, four short of two-thirds, have presently petitioned Congress for a Convention on a balanced budget amendment, it is truly time for stronger medicine than the continuing piecemeal amendment process.

The states should begin petitioning Congress for an unrestricted Convention designed to bring the Constitution in line with the desires of the people on a host of issues to be discussed in this article.

Posted by Lawrence Solum on August 31, 2006 at 06:02 AM