The Model State Application
The resolution a state legislature adopts to apply, under Article V, for a convention limited to one subject — the authority to regulate money in our elections.
This is a working draft, published so legislators, legal scholars, and coalition partners can read and stress-test it. The single-subject and aggregation language is the heart of the document, and the part most in need of expert scrutiny.
Finalized application will be published in print and for download.
Whereas, Article V of the Constitution of the United States provides that, on the application of the legislatures of two-thirds of the several states, the Congress shall call a convention for proposing amendments; and
Whereas, the Framers included the convention method so that the states could obtain needed amendments when the Congress is itself an interested party and unlikely to act; and
Whereas, the influence of concentrated and corporate money in federal elections is a matter on which the members of Congress are themselves principal beneficiaries of the present system, making the convention method the appropriate avenue for reform; and
Whereas, the people and the several states ought to retain the authority to regulate the raising and spending of money in their elections, and to require the disclosure of such money; and
Whereas, the Legislature of the State of [STATE] desires that any such convention be strictly limited to that single subject, and to no other; now, therefore, be it
Keep the affirmative framing — "restore the authority to regulate" — rather than naming a single court decision. Affirmative, durable framing widens the coalition and survives changes in case law.
Section 1. Application. The Legislature of the State of [STATE] hereby applies to the Congress of the United States, under Article V of the Constitution of the United States, for the calling of a convention for proposing amendments, limited to proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States that affirms and restores the authority of the United States, the several states, and the people to regulate the raising and spending of money in elections, including the authority to limit and to require the disclosure of contributions and expenditures and to draw distinctions between natural persons and artificial entities with respect thereto.
Section 2. Single subject. This application is made solely with respect to the subject described in Section 1. The convention called upon this and like applications shall have no authority to propose, debate, or consider any amendment, measure, or subject other than that subject, and the delegates of this state are instructed accordingly as provided by the laws of this state.
Section 3. Aggregation, expressly limited. This application shall be aggregated, for the purpose of attaining the two-thirds of states necessary to require the calling of a convention, only with applications of other states on the same subject of regulating the raising and spending of money in elections, including but not limited to the applications of Vermont (2014); Rhode Island (2016); [UPDATE LIST OF SISTER STATES]. This application shall not be aggregated with, or counted toward, any application for a general or unlimited convention, nor any application on the subject of a balanced budget, fiscal restraints, term limits, or any subject other than that described in Section 1.
Section 4. Delegate Specifics. This General Assembly hereby respectfully requests that the delegates to said Convention be elected directly by the qualified voters of each state, apportioned among the several states substantially according to each state's representation in the United States Congress and that further no individual elected or appointed to federal office, now or in the recent past, be permitted to serve as a delegate to the Convention.
Section 5. Continuing application. This application shall constitute a continuing application in accordance with Article V until the legislatures of at least two-thirds of the several states have made application on the same subject, or until this application is rescinded by the Legislature of the State of [STATE].
Section 6. Transmittal. The Secretary of State [or Clerk] is directed to transmit certified copies of this application to the President of the Senate and the Secretary of the Senate of the United States, to the Speaker and the Clerk of the House of Representatives of the United States, to each member of this state's congressional delegation, and to the presiding officer of each house of the legislature of each of the several states, requesting their cooperation.
Section 3 keeps these applications counting only with the campaign-finance family and expressly out of the balanced-budget tally, which sits near its own threshold. The same-subject rule is not invented: Senator Sam Ervin's convention-procedures bill — passed by the Senate in 1971 and 1973 — would have aggregated applications only by the same subject within a seven-year window, the approach this clause follows.
We are actively seeking expert input on the points below before finalizing. If you are a constitutional-law scholar or practitioner, we would value your view on any of these.
- Is the same-subject aggregation language strong enough? Section 3Section 3 limits aggregation to applications "on the same subject" and recites sister applications by name. Is express same-subject language sufficient to keep a reviewing court or Congress from counting these toward a general convention — and does naming applications by year strengthen the showing, or risk implying that unnamed campaign-finance applications are excluded?
- Can the single-subject limit be made judicially cognizable? Section 2In Coleman v. Miller (1939) the Court treated much of the amendment process as a political question for Congress. Is there a textual or structural hook that would let a court enforce the single-subject limit if a convention strayed — or should it rest entirely on the political checks: instructed delegates, a germaneness rule, and the thirty-eight-state ratification backstop?
- Affirmative framing, or name the decision? Section 1, PreambleThe application uses affirmative framing — "affirms and restores the authority to regulate" — rather than naming Citizens United or any single decision. Does declining to name a decision create interpretive ambiguity about the amendment's intended scope, or is the decision-agnostic framing strictly preferable for durability and coalition breadth?
- Should a continuing application carry a time horizon? Section 5Section 5 makes the application continuing until rescinded. In light of the seven-year contemporaneousness window in the Ervin bill, would an express time horizon or sunset strengthen the same-subject, same-era aggregation argument — or does an open-ended application serve the path to thirty-four states better?
This text is a draft. Help us finish it.
If you are a constitutional-law scholar or practitioner, your read on the open questions above would materially improve the final language. The finished version will be published here for distribution and free download.
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