Repeal the 17th Amendment?

[native]

The idea is that it would be a first step towards returning power that has been stripped from the states. I am not really arguing for or against, just trying to think through the issues.

My argument against, though, is that what if this is the only step and now we have Senators who are less inclined to be responsive to the public and are now beholden to some fairly seedy state governments. I'm a PA guy, and there's no way I want to abdicate my responsibility for voting for Senator to the quamire that is Harrisburg politics.

I'm not so concerned about the issue of state rights. What powers are we talking about returning to the states? It's not like states are without a fair amount of power currently. Before we would even talk about how to go about returning power to the states, it would be good to talk about what specifically is being done at the Federal level that we should instead be doing at the state level.

Lordy, Lordy! Can you be serious?!???

It's not that I want the Civil War to be undone, but the unintended consequences of the Civil War and nearly all the consequences of the Progressive movement, intended and otherwise, have been very destructive of the Constitution, including state's rights and individual liberty.

DAMM slavery to hell!

[ATrain]

While Virginia is the best manage and one of the more effecient states in the nation (I know, I work for the lovely Commonwealth of Virginia), I shudder to think how we'd select senators when one house of our legislature is controlled by dems and the other by repubs.

[houndawg]

I don't know. Corruption is corruption, whether at the state level or at the federal level. I would rather have the right to vote against Joe/Beau Biden than entrust that decision to a bunch of yokels in Dover.

Maybe so, Ivytalk, but I think this idea deserves a serious discussion.

Six of one, half-dozen of the other. You can elect your own crook directly or have the crooks in the State government appoint one of their crooks. Won't make a dime's worth of difference to the man on the street.