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Congress to yield to public pressure and approve the 17th Amendment, providing for the popular election of Senators. A quarter of a century later, a movement began to put a 25% ceiling on the federal income tax rate in peacetime. Because of confusion over petitions, it was never clear exactly how many states had voted for the resolution, so Congress procrastinated until support waned for what was called by its foes the "millionaire's amendment." In 1964 the U.S. Supreme Court's one-man, one-vote ruling provoked an almost one-man crusade by Illinois Republican Senator Everett Dirksen to overturn the decision by constitutional amendment. Five years later only one additional state was needed to call a convention, and Wisconsin became the battleground. The amendment was rejected by the Wisconsin legislature, and the movement died out.
Congress cannot count on the current drive subsiding any time soon. Even if Congress manages to block the budget-balancing amendment, the demand for cost cutting will continue. As Jarvis says, "The people don't want a convention. They want tax reduction." In the end Congress will have to take some action to appease public opinion. The whole Constitutional Convention movement would not have started in the first place if Congress and the Carter Administration had been more responsive to the public outcry for tax relief during a time of rapidly rising inflation. Congress has all the power it needs to curb spending; all it may lack is the will and the courage.
Realists to the core, the framers of the Constitution knew that there would be times when even the best of governments would resist the will of the people it claims to serve. The effect of Article V is that without actually being used, it can pressure Congress to make the kind of change that is desired by a substantial majority of the American people. -
* Founded in 1969, the union is a nonpartisan group of more than 100,000 members who fight for less government spending and lower taxes.