Not sure if this should be in the political section or not so I'm just going to put it here. Now this a list from a book given to me by my 12th grade AP US Government teacher called "The US Constitution And Fascinating Facts About It" The following is a limited list of some of the propsed amendments that never left the halls of Congree. 1876: An attempt to abolish the US Senate. 1876: The forbidding of religious leaders from occupying a governmental office or receiving federal funding. 1878: An Executive Council of three to replace the office of President. 1893: Renaming this nation the "United States of the Earth". 1893: Abolishing the US Army and Navy 1894: Acknowledging that the Constitution recognize God and Jesus Chirst as the supreme authorities in human affairs 1912: Making marriage between races illegal 1914: Finding divorce to be illegal 1916: All acts of war should be put to a national vote. Anyone voting yes had to register as a volunteer for service in the US Army. 1933: An attempt to limit personal wealth to $1 million. 1947: The income tax maximum for an individual should not exceed 25% 1948: The right of Citizens to segregate themselves from others. 1971: Americans citizens should have the unalienable right to an environment free of pollution.
Some of these are just ridiculous. Some actually sound not-too-bad. Take the 1947 one. That is kind of umm... LOWER than what alot of American citizens pay in income tax already.
Bear in mind this isn't a comprehensive list. There's been 2 or 3 proposed in this congressional term, but they're all pretty reasonable. Fun fact, the bill or rights originally had 12 amendments, one of which was passed in the 1970's or 80's
And the others? Though, in retrospect, some of them are not so much ridiculous as impractical to impliment. Though the 25% one SEEMS good, it would hamper the US ability in proportional taxing, which is all the craze now thanks to Buffet.
That is true the book I'm getting this info from dosen't list every proposed amendment. Also what were the two amendments that didn't make it into the bill of rights? What others? Also I agree some on the list don't sound that bad or ridiculous.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_the_First and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twenty-seventh_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution
1894: Acknowledging that the Constitution recognize God and Jesus Chirst as the supreme authorities in human affairs Yeah fuck separation of church and state.
Not to pick at people, but: 1916 would violate people's right to a closed vote. That is, people have the right to keep secret what they voted. The U.S. makes use of the secret ballot for a reason, you know. Or the 'Australian ballot' as they call it. 1933 is just ridiculous. Limiting the ceiling of wealth would severly hamper the economy. Why would I want to live in a place that is Capitalist that limits the extent to which I can gather my wealth? And for that matter, what right does the government have to tell me what to do with my money? Plus, the Amendments are for protecting the individual, not limiting it. I have no idea what 1971 is talking about. I have the feeling that the OP misprinted it. Can someone clarify?
Yeah... no That would be a terrible, terrible name. You don't see the UN being called 'THe United States of the Earth' do you? NO. They call it the United Nations, which still somehow manages to maintain some level of respectability to the title name despite all that has happened. Come to think of it... not alot of futuristic Space Earths with non-facist-sounding titles, huh? The Federation The Imperium The Systems Alliance The United Nations Space Command [which is, for all intents and purposes, not so cheery]
Yeah... no. I would still take any of the science-fiction facist names over "THe United States of the Earth".
Prob meant to say inalienable... In any case, I don't really think that we have a right to a closed vote, generally elections are left up to the states. I could do some more research, but I'm pretty sure that even we have developed such a right through jurisprudence, it would have been prior to 1916, and a constitutional amendment would supersede it and replace the precedent. Keep in mind this was introduced during a period in our nations history when we were debating joining world war 1, which was pretty strongly opposed for a long time. It's similar to how nowadays we criticize politicians for sending the young men of our country off to war, when more often then not their own children sit safely at home.
I'm glad most of these proposals never became reality. Most of them sound pretty silly and even funny. I can kinda understand the good intentions behind some of them. But why did they want to abolish the US army and Navy? Edit: And isn't the United States of the Earth the name of the country that consists of the entire world in Futurama?
As I recall, closed voting became an issue around the turn of the century. The Populists wanted that Amendment, right?
I really don't know, all the book dose is give you proposed Amendment and the year, but thats a pretty bad one have they hered of speration of church and state.
