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can someone explain the 27th ammendment

goligoth

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We just recently went over the constitution and we spent about one day reviewing ammendments..... the 27th ammendment seems slightly corrupt and evil.....or at least the way it was interpretted to me anyway....my teacher was very vague and the book had the word for word ammendment but I was wondering if anyone could put it simply for me.....
 
goligoth said:
We just recently went over the constitution and we spent about one day reviewing ammendments..... the 27th ammendment seems slightly corrupt and evil.....or at least the way it was interpretted to me anyway....my teacher was very vague and the book had the word for word ammendment but I was wondering if anyone could put it simply for me.....

Take a look at this:

http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/data/constitution/amendment27/
 
goligoth said:
We just recently went over the constitution and we spent about one day reviewing ammendments..... the 27th ammendment seems slightly corrupt and evil.....or at least the way it was interpretted to me anyway....my teacher was very vague and the book had the word for word ammendment but I was wondering if anyone could put it simply for me.....

It basically says that if Congress votes to give themselves a pay raise, it won't take effect until after the next election of Congress. The idea is to prevent Congress from robbing the treasury for personal purposes before the voters can hold them accountable.
 
Kandahar said:
It basically says that if Congress votes to give themselves a pay raise, it won't take effect until after the next election of Congress. The idea is to prevent Congress from robbing the treasury for personal purposes before the voters can hold them accountable.

so basically they vote their successors a pay raise?
 
Kandahar said:
Exactly.



..


even though that is a little bit better than what I was thinking it still isn't a great idea.....being able to control wages of people like yourself....
 
goligoth said:
so basically they vote their successors a pay raise?

no, since 90-96% of the last congressional elections resulted in incumbant candidates winning, they actually "vote" themselves pay raises.

Now, of course, they wrote a law that establishes automatic pay increases, and they actually now have to vote NOT to increase their pay.
 
The 27th Amendment was originally part of the Bill of Rights, but was not ratified until the 1990s.
 
libertarian_knight said:
no, since 90-96% of the last congressional elections resulted in incumbant candidates winning, they actually "vote" themselves pay raises.

Now, of course, they wrote a law that establishes automatic pay increases, and they actually now have to vote NOT to increase their pay.

Do you have a link or something like that to support this...
 
goligoth said:
Do you have a link or something like that to support this...

"Candidate-centered voting is a major advantage to incumbent members of Congress. Incumbents, in general, receive far more exposure on television and in newspapers than those challenging them. With greater media exposure and substantial influence over public policy, incumbents are also able to raise far greater sums of money with which to campaign. For these reasons and more, incumbents who run for reelection are very likely to win. In 2002, 398 House members ran for reelection, and only 16 were defeated, while a mere three out of 26 senators running for reelection lost. With a reelection rate of 88 percent for the Senate and 96 percent for the House, it is fair to say that congressional elections are not just candidate centered but incumbent centered as well."

http://usinfo.state.gov/products/pubs/election04/congress.htm

==

these results are pretty typical. I can find more, if you want.
 
libertarian_knight said:
"Candidate-centered voting is a major advantage to incumbent members of Congress. Incumbents, in general, receive far more exposure on television and in newspapers than those challenging them. With greater media exposure and substantial influence over public policy, incumbents are also able to raise far greater sums of money with which to campaign. For these reasons and more, incumbents who run for reelection are very likely to win. In 2002, 398 House members ran for reelection, and only 16 were defeated, while a mere three out of 26 senators running for reelection lost. With a reelection rate of 88 percent for the Senate and 96 percent for the House, it is fair to say that congressional elections are not just candidate centered but incumbent centered as well."

http://usinfo.state.gov/products/pubs/election04/congress.htm

==

these results are pretty typical. I can find more, if you want.

That's all right; this works fine. So if this is truly how the system works then how exactly is this constitutional?
 
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