“I think we’re going to win these cases. But say the worst happens and we lose in a broad way – that means that the Court somehow does a Roe, a Roe v. Wade, on marriage and says that all these state constitutional amendments are overturned, gay marriage is now a constitutional right – well, we’re going to press forward on a Federal Marriage Amendment. We’ve always supported a Federal Marriage Amendment, and there’s a lot of misconceptions about it. Some people try and argue, ‘Well, this is against federalism.’ No, our founders gave us a system where we can amend the Constitution.
“We shouldn’t have to do this, we shouldn’t have to worry about activist judges, you know, making up out of thin air a constitutional right that obviously none of our founders found there and no one found there until quite recently. But if we do, for us, the Federal Marriage Amendment is a way that people can stand up and say, ‘Enough is enough.’ We need a solution in this country, we cannot be, as Lincoln said, half slave, half free. We can’t have a country on key moral questions where we’re just, where we don’t have a solution. And if the Court forces a solution, the way we’ll amend that is through the Federal Marriage Amendment.” – Hate group leader Brian Brown via Right Wing Watch
Since 1789, there have been over 11,000 attempts to amend the US Constitution. While these may be approached by “national convention,” none of those attempts have succeeded.
Only 27 amendments have been added to the Constitution. The first ten are known as the Bill of Rights. The last amendment was added in 1992.
There are two steps to passing an amendment: Proposal and Ratification.
The amendment must first be proposed a 2/3 vote of Congress.
Ratification occurs with a 3/4 vote of the state legislatures or a 3/4 vote of state conventions made up of delegates (not necessarily legislators) elected by the people. That would mean 38 states would have to ratify the amendment.
Not gonna happen with marriage equality, Brian…
