Third Assignment

I have divided the class into four discussion groups of four or five students each. Every group will exchange ideas about the issues and methods of online and library research. Within each group, every student will ask another to review her or his paper. The reviewer’s name should appear on the paper, along with that of the author.

Richard Cordero                 Ryan Gaghen
David Eglin                         Mingyu Liu
Luc Fabing                          Paloma Oliveri

Tanzila Jamal                      Cathy Wang        

Claire Moore                                 

Samuel Johnson-Saeger       Zaynamin Murtaza

Annika Johnson                    Evan Sevaly

Stacey Leyva                        Jaxson Sharpe

Andrew Rizko                      Bettina Vargas Franca Passos   

Louis Layman                      Diana Zhou

Pick a proposed amendment to the U.S. Constitution concerning justice, civil rights and liberties, elections, and political participation,.  (Do not write about amendments to abolish or alter the electoral college, which is what everybody would choose.)  What is the political motivation behind the proposal?  What are the arguments for and against it?  If you were a member of Congress, would you support it? 

Here are some examples from the 117th Congress:

S.J. Res. 1 -- Equal Rights Amendment deadline

H.J.Res.4 -- pardon power

H.J.Res.19 -- repeal 23d Amendment

H.J.Res.23 -- lower voting age to 16

H.J.Res.24 -- apportionment by citizen population

H.J. Res 39 -- size of Supreme Court
H.J. Res. 42 -- admission of new states

H.J.Res.48 -- no constitutional rights for corporations

H.J. Res. 51 -- flag desecration

H.J. Res. 53 -- involuntary servitude as punishment

H.J. Res. 69 -- term limits

H.J. Res. 80 -- campaign finance

H.J. Res. 95 -- regulation of corporations

H.J. Res. 98 -- right to vote

Of course, you may write about other proposed amendments as well, including those from before the 117th Congress.

Note that bill numbers start over again with each new Congress.  H.J. Res. 80 from the 117th Congress is completely different from H.J. Res. 80 from the 115th Congress.

Your essay must have at least five different sources.  As I hope that you learned from the riddles, print books are still useful. * Other possible sources include:

• CQ Library
• Law reviews on Lexis-Nexis (click "advanced options" and select "law reviews")
• Congress.gov (http://www.congress.gov/) -- official site for bill summary and status 
• GovTrack (http://www.govtrack.us/) – unofficial site for congressional information 
• ProQuest Congressional, via Honnold menu -- many congressional documents including searchable Congressional Record. Click “databases,” then the letter “P,” then “ProQuest Congressional.”) 
• Committee web pages, which usually contain testimony and text of reports. See http://www.house.gov/committees/ or http://www.senate.gov/pagelayout/committees/d_three_sections_with_teasers/committees_home.htm

Your sources may include specialized references such as The Almanac of American Politics, but do not cite general-purpose encyclopedias such as Encyclopaedia Britannica and Encyclopedia Americana. And especially do not cite Wikipedia. 

• Assignments should be typed, double-spaced, and no more than six pages long. Use 12-point type and one-inch margins.  
• Cite your sources with endnotes, which should be in standard Turabian format.
• Endnote pages do not count against the page limit. 
• Watch your spelling, grammar, diction, and punctuation. Errors will count against you.
• Return assignments to the class Sakai dropbox (in Word format, not pdf) by 11:59 PM, Friday, November 11. (Yes, you have more time than the syllabus indicates.) I reserve the right to dock papers one gradepoint for one day’s lateness and a full grade for two or more days’ lateness. 

*The link takes you to a 1967 Star Trek clip.  Fifty-five years ago, the notion of using a desktop to access laws and law books was still science fiction.