The State Constitutional

Convention Clearinghouse

U.S. states where the people can use a periodic state constitutional convention referendum to bypass the legislature's gatekeeping power over constitutional amendment

U.S. Constitution

U.S. Constitution
September 17, 1787

Article V. The Congress, whenever two-thirds of both houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose amendments to this constitution, or on the application of the legislatures of two-thirds of the several states, shall call a convention for proposing amendments, which , in either case, shall be valid to all intents and purposes, as part of this constitution, when ratified by the legislatures of three-fourths of the several states, or by conventions in three-fourths thereof, as the one or the other mode of ratification may be proposed by the Congress: Provided, that no amendment which may be made prior to the year 1808, shall in any manner affect the first and fourth clauses in the ninth section of the first article; and that no state, without its consent, shall be deprived of its equal suffrage in the Senate.

 

Articles of Confederation
November 15, 1777

Article XIII. Every State shall abide by the determination of the United States in Congress assembled, on all questions which by this confederation are submitted to them. And the Articles of this Confederation shall be inviolably observed by every State, and the Union shall be perpetual; nor shall any alteration at any time hereafter be made in any of them; unless such alteration be agreed to in a Congress of the United States, and be afterwards confirmed by the legislatures of every State.

U.S. Constitutional Convention at Harvard Law School

Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics, Conference on a U.S. Constitutional Convention, Harvard Law School,����September 24, 2011.

Keynote presentation, Professor��Larry Lessig.

Political Panel.

Legal Panel.