Seldom has a claim so weak been so often advanced than the claim that a convention for proposing amendments would be a “constitutional convention” that could “run away”—that is, disregard its limits and propose amendments outside its sphere of authority.
I have little patience with the theory, partly because it is so patently based on ignorance of history and constitutional law and partly because it first widely publicized as part of a deliberate disinformation campaign to disable one of our Constitution’s key checks and balances.
Nevertheless, early in 2013 I took the time to pen a lengthy rebuttal to the runaway scenario, examining the question from almost every possible angle. I did, however, leave one thing out: Modern communications technology makes a “runaway” essentially impossible.
I have, therefore, added the following to my 2013 essay:
There is another aspect of this the “runaway” theorists overlook: modern communications. Even if the 1787 convention had run away, modern communications render the analogy an ill-fitting one. As Walter Phelps Hall and Robert Greenhalgh Albion pointed out in their History of England over 60 years ago, before modern communications diplomats were unable to consult home authorities quickly and sometimes had to make decisions that presented those authorities with a fait accompli. But today’s communications enable the authorities to control their diplomats to the point that the latter can be turned into “nothing but damned errand boys at the end of a wire.” At any convention for proposing amendments, the state commissioning authorities will be in constant contact with their commissioners.