Is it time for a Constitutional Amendment?

Here in Illinois, protection of the status quo of the two dominant parties, and their stranglehold on the voters of the state, has been codified in the election statutes. In Illinois, at least, this has created an atmosphere of extreme corruption and ineffective government.

In Illinois, anyone not a member of the Democratic or Republican Party is nearly blocked from access to the ballot, and the bar is set ridiculously high.

For a member of one of those political parties to become a candidate to sit in the Illinois House of Representatives, it takes 1,800 petition signatures to gain access to the ballot.

For any third party candidate, it takes 5% of the registered voters in the district. And most districts have roughly 300,000 registered voters – or that third party candidate needs to obtain 15,000 signatures.

Of what are the Big Two scared? How can this be Constitutional? Isn’t this a violation of Amendments 1 and 14?

The way most voters cast their ballot, their Party affiliation borders on religion. They blindly follow whatever their leader says, and vote for whoever is on the ballot with that particular affiliation attached to their name. They take on faith that that candidate, by mere association with a particular Party, is going to serve them best.

Sheep. The voters are sheep being led to slaughter every time they cast a vote in that manner. Thomas Jefferson’s concern about democracy is coming to roost – the electorate is no longer becoming informed about who is running for office. The electorate is having forced upon them the most power-hungry amongst us for any office higher than the local level.

I say it is time to weaken this system of corruption. I propose:

“There shall be no law respecting an establishment of political affiliation, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”