this post was submitted on 12 Oct 2023
1208 points (90.1% liked)

Microblog Memes

5736 readers
2373 users here now

A place to share screenshots of Microblog posts, whether from Mastodon, tumblr, ~~Twitter~~ X, KBin, Threads or elsewhere.

Created as an evolution of White People Twitter and other tweet-capture subreddits.

Rules:

  1. Please put at least one word relevant to the post in the post title.
  2. Be nice.
  3. No advertising, brand promotion or guerilla marketing.
  4. Posters are encouraged to link to the toot or tweet etc in the description of posts.

Related communities:

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] forrgott@lemm.ee 16 points 1 year ago (1 children)

One of their ideas I personally think would be amazing: allegedly, Thomas Jefferson predicted the Construction would only last less than twenty years before we would completely overhaul our core document of governance. I believe rebuilding the specific details every couple decades would've helped tremendously....

[–] MxM111@kbin.social 18 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Can’t even imagine rebuilding constitution in our current political environment.

[–] starman2112@sh.itjust.works 11 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

~Every single generation since the founding of this country

I agree though. I can think of many times in history that a rewriting of the bill of rights would have excluded free speech. Imagine if the current supreme court had the authority to revoke the separation of church and state, and mandate that all public schools have a Protestant focus.

[–] MxM111@kbin.social 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Thus back to the wisdom of the founding fathers.

[–] Neato@kbin.social 6 points 1 year ago (2 children)

"Wisdom" like the 3/5ths compromise. They were writing it specifically because they were completely terrified of strong central governments and autocracy. They didn't give one shit about anyone other than themselves and their rich compatriots. You used to have to be a landowner to vote. They had some good ideas but the fact a functional system of government came out of them that has any usage in the modern day is more of a happy accident than any real forethought.

[–] starman2112@sh.itjust.works 7 points 1 year ago

The 3/5ths compromise is an interesting and often misunderstood one. Slave owning states wanted their slaves counted in the state's population, because more people means more representation in the House of Representatives, and more electoral college votes. Since slaves didn't have any say in politics, this solely benefited the people who owned them. Free states didn't want slaves counted towards the census for that exact reason, and the 3/5ths compromise came out of that disagreement. It was never about how much of a person slaves are, and the bad guys got their way by exploiting their slaves for even more political power.

[–] MxM111@kbin.social 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I will take accidentally being right (and tested over time) over thoughtfully being wrong.

[–] Honytawk@lemmy.zip 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Sure, but that isn't wisdom, it is luck.

[–] MxM111@kbin.social 1 points 1 year ago

Well, it’s not like they randomly spewed the words in foundational documents. They did think it through. Luck was about historical conditions that they were in, so that they could make these conclusions.

[–] Cryophilia@lemmy.world 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

One party is seeking a constitutional convention. In order to install a permanent Republican dictatorship.

[–] lolcatnip@reddthat.com 1 points 1 year ago

That's a pipe dream. Laws have weight because the constitution says they do, but the constitution only matters because it's pretty much universally agreed upon. No constitution the Republicans would write will gain that kind of acceptance, or even the acceptance of a majority.

[–] forrgott@lemm.ee 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It pains me to admit I see your point. If we had developed some mechanism early on where problematic passages or even sections could be democratically identified, as well as a system to propose possible changes for vote...but now? Yikes.

Somehow, I want to believe it is possible to revolutionize our government, but without the usual bloodshed. I just wish I had any clue how.... :p

[–] Cryophilia@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago

Please for the love of God tell me this is satire