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What Doesn't Work. Jon Roland at Jekyll Island 20090522
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Jun 5, 2025
Jon Roland gives (exactly) 5-minute talk on how reformers often fail because they don't provide the precise language of their reforms that resist misinterpretation, and how we can't depend on professionals to do it for us.
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thanks to michael blednard for
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introducing me so alan have to
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however he didn't mention that
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for every election since 1960
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i have been involved in them often as a
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candidate
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and almost every political reform
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movement since that time
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during the course of that i've learned a
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few things
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what works and what doesn't work
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what does not work
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is asking officials for answers
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for proof of their authority
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that worked during the first 60 years of
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this country
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but that remedy has been largely
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withdrawn from our reach
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what also does not work
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is to demand reforms
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of others
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expecting them to work out the details
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i learned as a
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litigator that if i wanted to get
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the case to come out the way i wanted it
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to
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even if i won
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officially
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i had to drive the court order
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if i didn't draft the court order it
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likely would it would be by my
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opposition
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i learned the law
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because i found i could not rely upon my
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lawyers
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to be competent
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i had to learn many other beetles that
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way
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you have to provide the draft language
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of any remedy
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that you expect to have
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and not only must it be drafted by you
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or us
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but it must be done so carefully that it
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can withstand the scrutiny of our
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friends
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and the opposition of our enemies
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we have to anticipate all the ways it
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could be misconstrued
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perhaps for another century or two
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and that's not easy to do
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also must be aware
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of
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adopting
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simple direct obvious
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approaches to our problems
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it is said that every problem has a
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simple direct obvious solution and is
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wrong
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the simple correct obvious solutions are
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already being used
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but we have
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before us is a complex system
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you push it at any point
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without knowing what you're doing you're
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going to get a thousand unintended
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consequences
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some of which could be truly disastrous
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you have to know what you're doing
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and you cannot depend
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on
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a religion of professionals
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to help them
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you have to acquire advanced
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professional skills yourselves
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on my website constitution.org i have
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long had a
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huge amount of material
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in the nature of complaints
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and demands for reform
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but until recently i was reluctant to
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actually post
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amendments to the constitution
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i was
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provoked into doing that
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by a friend
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larry randy barnett
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professor of law at georgetown
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university
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and a polite mind to ourselves
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who posted a
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set of amendments
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on a website called
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federalism.com
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well
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it's an earnest first effort but even
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for randy who is a truly
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expert constitutional scholar
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he got a lot of things wrong
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and he got a lot of heat from it from
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his colleagues and for me frankly
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but i decided it was time to round up
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all of the drafting that i've been doing
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and putting it on my website
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and i send it around by email to a lot
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of you the ones that i have email
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addresses for
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the point of this exercise is that in
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order
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for us to bring
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officials into compliance with the
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constitution we have to be able to spell
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out in no uncertain terms what
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compliance consists of
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it's not enough to say this or that is
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unconstitutional
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you have to be able to say what is
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constitutional
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and that is good with no compromise
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and
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this is five
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yeah there you go
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oh
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