We Actually Don't Need Congress Anymore

By Carl Gibson, Reader Supported News

06 November 14

merican voters proved this week that when Congress fails to get something done, the people have the means to do it themselves. Direct democracy through statewide ballot initiatives has proven to be much more effective and more satisfying than waiting for a deadlocked Congress to catch up to the will of the people.

When Americans overwhelmingly supported increased background checks on gun purchases in the wake of almost two dozen children getting massacred in school, Congressional Republicans wouldn’t agree to anything. When 70 percent of Americans polled supported an increase in the federal minimum wage to $10.10 an hour, Congressional Republicans refused to take action. When most Americans supported a “Buffett Rule” stating that billionaires should never pay a lower tax rate than working people by a 2 to 1 margin, Congressional Republicans dug in their heels and filibustered. Neither Democrats nor Republicans in Congress would dare to rein in the prison-industrial complex, much less even utter the phrase in the first place. And legalizing marijuana at the federal level? Forget about it.

However, ballot initiatives passed last night accomplished all of those things in multiple states. Washington State voters passed increased gun background checks, voters in 4 states increased the minimum wage, Illinois voters taxed millionaires to raise more money for schools, and voters in California all agreed to rein in the prison-industrial complex by changing low-level, nonviolent drug offenses from felonies to misdemeanors. Voters in Alaska, Oregon, and Washington, DC, all agreed to legalize marijuana. And that’s just from this year – ballot initiatives passed in the last two years legalized marijuana in Colorado, Washington State, and Portland, Maine; raised taxes on the wealthy in California to end the the state’s budget woes; legalized gay marriage in Maryland and Maine, and raised the minimum wage in New Jersey. If the American people were Congress, our country would be in much better shape right now.

It doesn’t really matter that the party that spent the last 6 years obstructing everything they could just won control of Congress. Everyone knows that since the Republicans don’t have a veto-proof majority, and that since Mitch McConnell’s history of divisiveness won’t win any remaining Democrats over to his side, Republican bills that don’t get filibustered will likely be vetoed by President Obama. After those vetoes, John Boehner and Mitch McConnell will continue to blame their inability to get anything done on the president, and congressional deadlock will continue. And really, it’s pretty ridiculous to think that 535 people, most of them millionaires, could adequately represent 310 million people.

In Article 1, Section 2 of the U.S. Constitution, the founders’ idea of proper apportionment was one representative for every 30,000 people. If that held true today, we would have over 10,000 members of Congress. That number of people would ensure a more representative democracy and more parties to check the monopoly held by Democrats and Republicans, and would allow citizens more direct access to their elected officials. But don’t hold your breath for 9,500 new Congressional districts to be drawn up after the next census. We no longer live in the days when Congress was a functional body that represented constituents’ interests and regularly passed laws for the betterment of society. Congress has long since been a breeding ground for corruption, in which a deluge of lobbyist gifts, campaign donations, and potential future careers of members take precedent over voting for what the people demand.

Let’s not kid ourselves – even if the tables were turned in the 2014 midterms and Democrats had a wave victory, gaining control of both the House and the Senate, the corrupt culture of Washington would prevail. The people’s interests would be forsaken as 535 people all vied for the biggest re-election war chest and most lucrative lobbying careers after retiring from public “service.” President Obama and the Democrats enjoyed such a supermajority for 60 working days after the 2008 election, but they took no action with it. It’s time we stop looking to well-connected politicians earning comfortable salaries in luxurious offices far away from constituents to be the saviors of working people. We’ve always held the power in our own hands through direct democracy.

There’s nothing stopping us from implementing single-payer healthcare in our own states, as Vermont already has. We already have the means to start petition drives for marijuana legalization. We can mobilize for a $15 an hour minimum wage like residents of Seattle and San Francisco. We can organize a ballot initiative for a free public WiFi network in our own city, like Chattanooga, Tennessee. We can increase funding to our schools with higher taxes on millionaires and billionaires in our own cities and states through the initiative process.

We have the power to ban harmful practices like fracking and the construction of oil and gas pipelines through private land and natural habitats. We are the ones who can abolish the “personhood” status of corporations where we live, ensuring that only flesh-and-blood human beings have constitutional rights and that money is property, not free speech. Residents of black cities with abusive white police forces, like Ferguson, could create civilian review boards with the authority to fire police officers found guilty of brutalizing citizens, as New Haven, Connecticut has. New Yorkers could, theoretically, launch a task force given the job of investigating, arresting, and charging the financial criminals in their state who caused the 2008 financial crisis.

All it takes is enough engaged citizens to organize and pass ballot initiatives. Let’s give direct democracy a try, and leave Capitol Hill to the vultures and wolves.

Carl Gibson, 26, is co-founder of US Uncut, a nationwide creative direct-action movement that mobilized tens of thousands of activists against corporate tax avoidance and budget cuts in the months leading up to the Occupy Wall Street movement. Carl and other US Uncut activists are featured in the documentary "We're Not Broke," which premiered at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival. He currently lives in Madison, Wisconsin. You can contact him at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it , and follow him on twitter at @uncutCG.

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