The great Pope (from the Roman Catholic point of view) Leo XIII was absolutely clear in his opposition to democracy. He also exhibited an intense interest in American democracy and how it could be shaped by the Church of Rome to her purpose. Over a century later the representative democracy of the United States is riddled like Swiss cheese by the inroads of Roman Catholic teachings (Social Doctrine.) A very prominent principle of the Roman Catholic Social Doctrine is Subsidiarity. It is clearly central to a constitutional convention called for by two-thirds of the State legislatures of America:-

Inside the Conservative Push for States to Amend the Constitution

Taking advantage of almost a decade of political victories in state legislatures across the country, conservative advocacy groups are quietly marshaling support for an event unprecedented in the nation’s history: a convention of the 50 states, summoned to consider amending the Constitution.

The groups are an amalgam of free-market, low-tax and small-government proponents, often funded by corporations and deeply conservative supporters like the billionaire Koch brothers and Donors Trust, whose contributors are mostly anonymous. They want an amendment to require a balanced federal budget, an idea many conservatives have embraced, many economists disdain and Congress has failed to endorse for decades.

But as the groups near their goal, critics and some skeptical constitutional scholars are warning that holding an amendment-writing meeting with no historical parallel and no written rules could open a Pandora’s box of constitutional mischief.

The process, which is playing out largely beyond public notice, rests on a clause in Article 5 of the Constitution that allows the states to sidestep Congress and draft their own constitutional amendments whenever two-thirds of their legislatures demand it.

That will by no means be easy. Even if the two-thirds threshold were reached, a convention would probably face a court battle over whether the legislatures’ calls for a convention were sufficiently similar. And as with any amendment that Congress proposes, state-written amendments would need approval by three-quarters of the states — either by their legislatures or by state conventions — to take effect.

But as Republicans have surged to control of state legislatures and moved sharply rightward during the Obama years, what was once a pet project of the party’s fringe has become a proposal with a plausible chance of success. Some of the former Republican presidential candidates, including comparative moderates like John Kasich and Jeb Bush, have endorsed a state amendment convention. . . (Underlined emphasis added)

These are extraordinary times as attested by this "event unprecedented in the nation’s history." That the groups pushing for action by the States are marshaling support quietly is consistent with the modus operandi of those who are working insidiously to dismantle the US Constitution. The "amalgam" of groups at work are predominantly, if not exclusively, the Religious Right alliance which is determined to turn the United States into a Theocracy:

Will Corporations, The Christian Right, and the Tea Party Get to Rewrite the Constitution?

Former U.S. Senator Jim DeMint (R-SC), the Tea Party icon who helped bring Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Mike Lee (R-UT) into the Senate, was ousted after four years as president of the Heritage Foundation in May 2017. [Ref. 1] DeMint had thought he would have more influence on policy from his perch at Heritage than he had in the Senate. But as it turned out, there was not only life after Heritage, but the possibility of greater influence still. “I feel like the Lord knows what He’s doing,” DeMint told broadcaster Glenn Beck, because now “I’m in a place where I can make a much bigger difference.”

The place where DeMint could make a bigger difference than as senator or head of the 800-pound gorilla of right-wing think tanks is Convention of States, a group mobilizing an effort to rewrite the U.S. Constitution through a set of amendments that would drastically limit the taxation, regulatory and oversight powers of the federal government and restructure our constitutional order into one focused on states’ rights. DeMint joined the group as a “senior advisor” and sees the project as a new Tea Party mission that’s “much bigger than the Tea Party.” [Ref. 2]

Convention of States is a political alliance between elements of the anti-regulatory Corporate Right and the Christian Right, organizing toward a constitutional convention that would destroy the underpinnings of Great Society projects like Medicare and food stamps, and New Deal programs like Social Security. They’re also turning their sights on the progressive gains from the turn of the 20th Century, such as the 16th Amendment, which allows the federal government to collect income taxes and which they believe started the disastrous course toward big government.

This effort, like the older, more focused drive for a convention to advance a balanced budget amendment, is promoted in part by the libertarian Koch brothers’ network—often called the “dark money ATM of the Right”—and the right-wing organizations they fund [Ref. 3,] like the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) [Ref. 4.] And it draws support from Christian Right figures rooted in Reconstructionist theology that believes God reserves tasks like education or caring for the poor for churches and families, not government [Ref. 5.]

Americans who feared the election of Donald Trump and Republican majorities in Congress would undermine Obama-era victories on healthcare and LGBTQ equality were right, of course. But that’s the tip of the iceberg. These battles represent a tiny piece of the Right’s long-term political vision of dismantling the federal government.

Political Research Associates published significant work in 2013 and 2014 by Frederick Clarkson, Rachel Tabachnick and Frank Cocozzelli on right-wing approaches to limiting or eroding the power of the federal government. These included various proposals for interstate compacts and different convention proposals. Also covered were threats of secession and civil war, and arguments for nullification—the theory, repeatedly rejected by the Supreme Court, that states can ignore or defy federal laws or court rulings they deem unconstitutional. Some segregationists championed nullification as a response to Brown v. Board of Education and some on the Right still call for a nullification strategy to resist developments on immigration, abortion rights, and marriage equality. All this is part of the political and religious context in which the rise of Convention of States is happening. And it has gone profoundly underreported.

Article V outlines two approaches for altering the Constitution. Every constitutional amendment to date has followed the first: Congress proposes an amendment with a two-thirds vote of both houses; it becomes part of the Constitution if it is ratified by three-quarters of the states. The second approach requires Congress to call a “convention for proposing amendments” when two-thirds of states apply for one via their state legislatures. Any proposed amendments would also require approval by three-quarters of the states before ratification.

Organizers of a convention focused on a balanced budget amendment have 27 of the 34 states required and have identified nine targets to take them toward their goal, which they hope to reach by July 4, 2018. The broader anti-federal-government Convention of States proposal has been approved by legislatures in 12 states; in nine more, a call passed one house of the legislature. According to Convention of States, more than 20 states considered legislation in 2017. (Underlined emphasis added.)

The outlook for America's Representative Democracy is bleak. Students of Bible prophecy can see the handwriting on the wall, figuratively speaking; but even in the secular world the alarm is being sounded on every side that the US Constitution as we know it is at risk:

States Likely Could Not Control Constitutional Convention on Balanced Budget Amendment or Other Issues

In the coming months, a number of states are likely to consider resolutions that call for a convention to propose amendments to the U.S. Constitution to require a balanced federal budget, and possibly to shrink federal authority in other, often unspecified, ways. Proponents of these resolutions claim that 28 of the 34 states required to call a constitutional convention already have passed such resolutions.

State lawmakers considering such resolutions should be skeptical of claims being made by groups promoting the resolutions (such as the American Legislative Exchange Council, or ALEC) that states could control the actions or outcomes of a constitutional convention. A convention likely would be extremely contentious and highly politicized, and its results impossible to predict.

A number of prominent jurists and legal scholars have warned that a constitutional convention could open up the Constitution to radical and harmful changes. For instance, the late Justice Antonin Scalia said in 2014, “I certainly would not want a constitutional convention. Whoa! Who knows what would come out of it?” Similarly, former Chief Justice of the United States Warren Burger wrote in 1988:

[T]here is no way to effectively limit or muzzle the actions of a Constitutional Convention. The Convention could make its own rules and set its own agenda. Congress might try to limit the Convention to one amendment or one issue, but there is no way to assure that the Convention would obey. After a Convention is convened, it will be too late to stop the Convention if we don’t like its agenda.

Such serious concerns are justified, for several reasons:

A convention could write its own rules. The Constitution provides no guidance whatsoever on the ground rules for a convention. . .

A convention could set its own agenda, possibly influenced by powerful interest groups. The only constitutional convention in U.S. history, in 1787, went far beyond its mandate. . .

A convention could choose a new ratification process. The 1787 convention ignored the ratification process under which it was established and created a new process, lowering the number of states needed to approve the new Constitution and removing Congress from the approval process. . .

No other body, including the courts, has clear authority over a convention. The Constitution provides for no authority above that of a constitutional convention, so it is not clear that the courts — or any other institution — could intervene if a convention did not limit itself to the language of the state resolutions calling for a convention. . .

Nowhere in any of the reports about the objective of the Balanced Budget Amendment is Subsidiarity specifically mentioned; but it is at the heart of the focus on the Federal government:

SUBSIDIARITY AS A PRLNCIPLE OF GOVERNANCE: BEYOND DEVOLUTION

With the ascension of George W. Bush to the presidency comes the public emergence of the subsidiarity principle, a doctrine previously familiar primarily to Catholic social theorists and observers of the European Union. Fundamentally and explicitly intertwined with Bush's "compassionate conservative" vision, subsidiarity calls for social problems to be addressed from the bottom up, rather than from the top down. Literally meaning "to 'seat' ('sid') a service down ('sub') as close to the need for that service as is feasible," subsidiarity holds that where families, neighborhoods, churches, or community groups can effectively address a given problem, they should. Where they cannot, municipal or state Governments should intervene. Only when the lower bodies prove ineffective should the federal government become involved.

Subsidiarity has assumed a decidedly conservative gloss in today's public policy debates. Clung to by those seeking to shrink federal government programs and largely ignored by those who oppose them, subsidiarity appears to have become the exclusive property of one side of the political spectrum. . .

If the following Roman Catholic analysis is correct, the ultimate application of subsidiarity to the body politic is a frightening prospect, and totally inimical to individual freedom. The following extracts are explicit:

Subsidiarity and Libertarian “Small Government”

1) Subsidiarity is a communitarian philosophy. In this doctrine the human person cannot be understood apart from his communal nature and his communal existence. Subsidiarity claims that a communal, social and political existence is imposed on the human person by human nature, by the natural law and, ultimately, by God. . .

2) Because subsidiarity claims that human nature is communal the same doctrine claims that our obligations to the community are imposed by nature, rather than by free agreement. So, for example, the authority of the government comes from God and the natural law rather than the free consent of the governed. The people must obey whether they have consented or not. . .

3) According to subsidiarity the good is to be pursued communally under the direction of and, if necessary, compulsion by the government. . .

4) The doctrine of subsidiarity holds that the common good has priority over individual freedom. . .

5) Subsidiarity understands relations between human persons, between the individual and the community, primarily in terms of moral obligations and secondarily in terms of rights. The role of government is to enforce obligations. The government must not simply restrict sins of commission (such as murder) but also present sins of omission (such as failing to contribute to the material support of the community) by compelling individuals into pertinent obligatory actions. . .

9) For subsidiarity, freedom is primarily freedom to live a Catholic and moral life, to pursue authentic cultural goods and to live in a community of life with one’s family, friends and neighbors. Economic freedom is of relatively low priority. Material wellbeing to pursue these higher goods is necessary and both this material wellbeing and the pursuit of these higher goods can necessitate placing restrictions on economic freedom. . .

11) Finally, subsidiarity sees human relations primarily as cooperative. Part of the communal nature of the human person is to live in charity, benevolence and mutual cooperation with others. This is not to deny that the effects of original sin often lead us to fail to live up to our nature in this regard. . .

Shades of the Image to the Beast!!

If even it were possible to limit a States' Constitutional Convention to the proposed Balanced Budget Amendment, it would still spell disaster for the United States:

Constitutional Balanced Budget Amendment Poses Serious Risks

Would Likely Make Recessions Longer and Deeper, Could Harm Social Security and Military and Civil Service Retirement

A balanced budget amendment to the U.S. Constitution would be a highly ill-advised way to address the nation’s long-term fiscal problems. It would threaten significant economic harm while raising a host of problems for the operation of Social Security and other vital federal programs.

The economic problems are the most serious. By requiring a balanced budget every year, no matter the state of the economy, such an amendment would raise serious risks of tipping weak economies into recession and making recessions longer and deeper, causing very large job losses. That’s because the amendment would force policymakers to cut spending, raise taxes, or both just when the economy is weak or already in recession — the exact opposite of what good economic policy would advise. . .

A constitutional convention would be a Brexit-scale crisis for the U.S.

. . . Even if a balanced-budget amendment were the only item on a convention’s agenda, that would be a disaster. Locking the world’s largest economy into a fiscal straightjacket would preclude any effective response to economic recession, forcing deep cuts in unemployment benefits and other aid at the very moment they are most needed. Suggested provisions that would allow supermajorities in both houses to waive the balance requirement would provide little relief. Consider that this year, neither chamber of Congress could muster a simple majority to pass a budget. If Congress fails to agree upon a balanced budget, who decides on the cuts? The president, acting unilaterally? The courts?

The bigger threat is that a constitutional convention, once unleashed on the nation, would be free to rewrite or scrap any parts of the U.S. Constitution. Do we really want to open up our nation’s core defining values to debate at a time when a serious candidate for the White House brags about his enthusiasm for torture and the surveillance state, wants to "open up" reporters to lawsuits, scoffs at the separation of powers and holds ideas about freedom of religion that are selective at best? . . .

The present presidential administration is already a huge disaster for the nation. Greater disaster looms in the future, and it is all due to alliance with the first Beast of Rev. 13 - more on this subject in the near future.