The Liberty Amendments: Restoring the American Republic

by Mark R. Levin

In Federalist 85, Alexander Hamilton—a leading advocate of a robust federal government—explained that “the national rulers, whenever nine [two-thirds] States concur, will have no option upon the subject. By the fifth article of the plan, the Congress will be obliged ‘on the application of the legislatures of two thirds of the States [which at present amount to nine], to call a convention for proposing amendments, which shall be valid, to all intents and purposes, as part of the Constitution, when ratified by the legislatures of three fourths of the States, or by conventions in three fourths thereof.’ The words of this article are peremptory. The Congress ‘shall call a convention.’ Nothing in this particular is left to the discretion of that body. And of consequence, all the declamation about the disinclination to a change vanishes in air.”31