Rebuild 3: The Next Ten

Andrea Dooley

14 Sep 2025 — 2 min read

I'll get to the links below, but first, I want to share an idea I've been kicking around all week. It is not, unfortunately, a plan to rescue the labor movement and thus the country. It's bigger than that.

Just as many of the solutions of our democracy originate in the Constitution, a lot of the problems in this country are also rooted in our founding document. The Second Amendment is an obvious problem, and clearly, the separation of powers has been eroded by the authoritarian plotting of Trump and his enablers. Amending the Constitution seems nearly impossible. The most recent amendment to go into effect - the 27th Amendment - was first proposed in 1789 but wasn't ratified until 1992. Efforts to pass additional amendments have failed because of the high hurdles to their adoption. Amendments require 2/3 of Congress for proposal and then ratification by 38 state legislatures. In today's divided political environment, it's almost impossible to imagine the kind of consensus that would be needed to pass an amendment.

But what if we tried to pass a lot of amendments all at once? I propose that we have a package of Ten Amendments that move through the ratification process all at once. The debate, and we should have them, would be about democratic reforms rather than the single issue contained in one amendment. Opponents of reform would have to justify the status quo, and the reality is that the status quo is unacceptable to a majority of people in this country.

I'm not an expert on democratic reform, but here are a few ideas that I think should be in the Democratic Reforms: Next Ten Package.

Electoral college reform: popular vote election of the president
Campaign Finance Reform: public financing of campaigns; get corporate money out of campaigns
Supreme Court Reform: term limits for serving as a Supreme Court justice, expands the courts
End Gerrymandering: nationwide, nonpartisan Congressional districting
Compulsory Voting or Universal Civic Duty Voting
Right to Reproductive Autonomy
Right to Safety: Reform the Second Amendment
Amendment Reform: Make it easier to reform the Constitution
Statehood Amendment: make it easier for districts and territories to become states if they elect to do so.
Legislative reform that includes impeachment reform and expanding Congress

I'm sure I've missed some, but these are areas of reform that I think the vast majority of Americans could support. If Democrats ran on a New Amendments platform that was organized around moving all these changes at one time, it would capture voters' attention and make reform possible.