Aug 07, 2026

The Seventeenth Amendment changed who picks your United States senator, and constitutional scholar Bill Norton argues it was never validly ratified. In 1913 the selection of senators moved from state legislatures to a statewide popular vote, and the states lost the single structural check they held over Washington. Jenny Beth Martin sits down with Norton for the bonus conversation following Lesson 3 of the founding-principles training on the U.S. Constitution, and the hour turns on one clause: Article Five says no state, without its consent, shall be deprived of its equal suffrage in the Senate. Norton's reading is that the Seventeenth Amendment therefore required unanimous ratification rather than three quarters of the states, and he says the states that never voted for it still have a case to bring. Along the way: why the three branches were never designed to be equal, the mixed form of government traced from Polybius through Montesquieu to John Adams, the Illinois Senate seat that was bought for $2,500 a legislator and the outrage that pushed the amendment through, why the Senate is poorly built to function as a democracy, the supremacy clause and what "in pursuance thereof" actually requires, nullification from Real ID to marijuana to sanctuary states, and the answer to the objection that repeal would take away your vote. Bill Norton is a constitutional scholar and author whose book Behind the Constitution is in draft and expected later this year. Get the free founding-principles training at teapartypatriots.org/1776. More at teapartypatriots.org and jennybethshow.com.

Read Full Show Notes →