Back when the Constitution was written, Senators were not elected by the people but were instead appointed by the legislatures of their respective states. The seventeenth Amendment was passed in 1913 in response to problems with this process; hostility within state legislatures was leaving some seats vacant, states had different processes for appointing senators, and corruption and bribery led to the appointment of many senators. For these reasons and others, momentum grew among the people to change the process to one of popular vote.

Though this news is a bit dated, retiring Senator Zell Miller (D-GA) introduced a resolution to repeal the Seventeenth Amendment. It isn't likely that this resolution is going anywhere as it has no cosponsers, and its primary sponsor won't be running for re-election this year.

During a rambling speech on the senate floor (click the S4503 link at the bottom), Miller complained about opposition to Bush's war, special interests, the attitudes of his fellow senators, the spending habits of the House, the entrenchment of incumbent candidates, unelected-black-robe-wearers, illegal immigration, environmentalists, unfunded mandates, campaign finance, and Political Action Committees.

His proposed solution for all that ails our representative government is to remove the representation: to repeal the seventeenth amendment and go back to state legislature appointments for senators.

Unfortunately, when considering the history of the amendment and why it was passed in the first place, all evidence points to its repeal doing nothing other than exchanging one set of problems for another. Further, I don't know about you, but I find insulting the notion that the people aren't smart enough to do their own electing or that we elect our representatives under duress from special interest groups.

I don't deny that lobbyists and PACs influence government more than most of us would like, but taking away elections from the people isn't going to change that. Suppose you were able to remove all external forces from every election (or appointment) in the nation; what happens after the election is over and your representative is off to Washington, DC?

Repealing the seventeeth amendment likely wouldn't solve any of the problems Senator Miller so eloquently described. At best we'd trade one set of problems for another. At worst, we'd make things substantially worse.

---Nick

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