The Constitution of the United States
Article 1. Section 1 & 2
By The Archon Magnate & The Statesman
We continue our section by section
discussion of the Constitution. In this
article, we cover Article I, Section 1
through Section 2.
Section 1 - The Legislature
All legislative Powers herein granted shall
be vested in a Congress of the United
States, which shall consist of a Senate and
House of Representatives.
An interesting note on this section is that
“legislative” means “law-making”. So this
passage could read “All law-making
Powers”. With that in mind, it becomes
quite clear that the Founders expressly
stated that the Legislative branch of the
government shall be the only branch that
makes policy and law. How contrary this is
to the government of today, where judges
make law from the stand, and the
President and Bureaucrats make policy on
a whim by signing their name to a piece
of paper. We must also remember that
democratic referendums, though
apparently innocent, are yet just another
attempt by the legislature to buck their
lawmaking responsibility to another
entity⎯the people.
The Legislative Branch depicts the dual
nature of our government. Each person
has two identities. We have both a
national and a federal identity. Just like
Christians have a citizenship on earth and
a citizenship in heaven. We have dual
identities. The House represents our
national identity⎯all Americans are
equal. The Senate represents the state
identity⎯all the States are equal.
Section 2 - The House
The House of Representatives shall be
composed of Members chosen every
second Year by the People of the several
States, and the Electors in each State shall
have the Qualifications requisite for
Electors of the most numerous Branch of
the State Legislature.
This section can actually be quite
confusing to the amateur Constitutionalist.
It speaks of the House of Representatives,
but then seems to move on to the
“Electors,” which would lead many
people to believe “Electoral College.” This
is not the case. Here, we simply have a
difference in language use. “Electors” in
this sense means “those who are being
elected,” i.e. the Representatives. For
added clarity, please read Federalist
Papers No. 52 and No. 53.
We see also in which direction the power
flows. Constitutional power flows from the
bottom up and from the inside out. This is
why the document is “expressed powers.”
Being qualified on the State level
automatically qualifies you on the
National level as well. You are not a
Virginian, for example, because you are
an American, you are an American
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because you are a Virginian. The Founders
understood this power flow and hence
wrote this section of the Constitution with
this in mind.
No Person shall be a Representative who
shall not have attained to the Age of
twenty five Years, and been seven Years a
Citizen of the United States, and who shall
not, when elected, be an Inhabitant of
that State in which he shall be chosen.
Here we see that certain age
requirements were laid out, and a person
actually had to live in the state that he
wanted to represent. It should be noted
that the requirements for being a
Representative were actually very simple.
Unlike our politicians today, the Founding
Fathers did not try to make rules,
regulations, laws, departments, and other
political paraphernalia to clutter the
normal process of democracy. Be 25 years
old, be a citizen of the U.S. for 7 years, live
in your state, and you can be a
Representative at the national level. A
very simple political process…what a
novel idea!
(Representatives and direct Taxes shall be
apportioned among the several States
which may be included within this Union,
according to their respective Numbers,
which shall be determined by adding to
the whole Number of free Persons,
including those bound to Service for a
Term of Years, and excluding Indians not
taxed, three fifths of all other Persons.)
(The previous sentence in parentheses
was superseded by Amendment XIV,
section 2.)
This section of the Constitution, as noted
by the text in bold, is no longer
applicable, but there is still some excellent
Original Intent contained here. The
number of Representatives that a
particular state could have was
determined by its population, as were the
taxes (yes, before the income tax came
out!). As we will see in the next paragraph,
it was one Representative for every 30,000
people.
It is worth mentioning that this particular
section of the Constitution is one of the
many that protected the institution of
slavery. While time and space does not
permit us to launch into a discussion of this
topic, it is important to make note of this
for understanding the Original Intent of
the Founders, and how the entire
Constitution interrelates to itself. It must be
noted that the “three fifths of all other
Persons” section of the Constitution is
misinterpreted to mean that the Founding
Fathers did not believe that the slaves
were one whole person. This is not the
case. Genesis 1:27 says that man is
created in the image of God. Therefore,
as the Declaration of Independence
makes clear, all men have certain
inalienable rights among which are “life,
liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” The
“three fifths” clause here was only
referring to taxing and representation. Say
for instance Virginia had 1 million slaves
they would get more representation than
another state who did not allow slavery. In
addition they would have more taxes. So
to even things out a bit the Founders
wrote this clause to say that for election
and taxing purposes slaves count for three
fifths of a person.
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The actual Enumeration shall be made
within three Years after the first Meeting of
the Congress of the United States, and
within every subsequent Term of ten Years,
in such Manner as they shall by Law
direct. The Number of Representatives
shall not exceed one for every thirty
Thousand, but each State shall have at
Least one Representative; and until such
enumeration shall be made, the State of
New Hampshire shall be entitled to chuse
three, Massachusetts eight, Rhode Island
and Providence Plantations one,
Connecticut five, New York six, New
Jersey four, Pennsylvania eight, Delaware
one, Maryland six, Virginia ten, North
Carolina five, South Carolina five and
Georgia three.
The Founders again demonstrated their
foresight and deep thought for the future
generations. Though they could not know
that the nation they were founding would
eventually exceed three hundred million
people (i.e. 10,000 Representatives…a
few too many politicians, in any case),
one Representative for every thirty
thousand people was, at the time, a
perfect ratio.1 They also knew that it
would be some time before the new U.S.
Congress would be able to assemble, so
they specifically stated how many
Representatives each state would have at
the first Congressional meeting. Of course,
this means that each state, before they
ratified this new Constitution, knew exactly
1 Based on population increases up to that time, 1 to
30,000 was to be usable for centuries to come. Of
course, with advanced farming methods, improved
medicine, and a host of other factors, population has
increased dramatically, so the ratio had to be adjusted.
how many Representatives they would
have. As we know, the states all
considered it an equitable agreement,
and as they say, the rest is history.
When vacancies happen in the
Representation from any State, the
Executive Authority thereof shall issue Writs
of Election to fill such Vacancies.
This clause allowed the President to fill any
vacancies that occurred in the House of
Representatives. If a Representative died,
was unable to fulfill his obligation,
convicted of a felony, etc., the President
would choose a qualified individual2 to fill
the vacancy for the remainder of the
term.
The House of Representatives shall chuse
their Speaker and other Officers; and shall
have the sole Power of Impeachment.
This clause is arguably the most important
in this section. Here, the House of
Representatives is granted incredible
power: the “Power of Impeachment.” The
House of Representatives is the decisionmaker
when it comes to impeachment
within any of the three branches. No
office is safe from the Representatives—
the President, Senatorial offices, Supreme
Court seats, etc.. This is an illustration of
the excellent check-and-balance system
built into our government by the Founders.
All three of the branches have some
power over the other, but it is limited and
specifically defined in the Constitution.
2 I.e., An individual who met the normal requirements
for Representatives
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A secondary purpose of this clause was to
clarify the one before it. The House has
the power to choose its Speakers and
Officers, the President does not. The
President may appoint a Representative
to fill a vacancy, but the House will
choose if that Representative becomes
the Speaker or any other Officer. In the
hypothetical situation where the Speaker
of the House dies, the President cannot
simply appoint someone who will
automatically become House Speaker.
The President can appoint someone to fill
the Representative position, but the House
as a whole must vote to elect that
Representative to become Speaker. This
was yet another check and balance built
into the system; the Executive branch has
some power over the Legislative, but it is
limited, and the favor is returned to the
Executive with the Legislative being given
the power of Impeachment.
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In conclusion, the House of
Representatives is just like any other
branch of the government: it has express
powers given to it by the Constitution, and
is limited only to those powers. It is onehalf
of the legislative branch (the Senate
being the other half), and is not to be
elevated above any other branch.
It is worth mentioning that the House of
Representatives was designed to
represent the common citizen of America.
That is the reason for the one to thirty
thousand ratio that we discussed earlier.
The people directly elected their
representatives, in hopes that one chosen
from among them would be able to
understand their needs and pay heed to
the “will of the people”. The Senate was to
represent the aristocracy and the state
legislatures, and as such was to be
elected by the state legislatures
themselves. All of that changed with
Amendment XVII (ratified April 8, 1913).
This amendment made senators to be
elected by popular vote, the same as
representatives. How much sense does it
make to have two bodies of politicians
elected by the people? This is just another
example of our switch from a Republic3 to
that of a Democracy.4⎯CC
