Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely Essay

“Absolute power corrupts absolutely.” Author John Acton is credited for this phrase, which is used a lot today as a way to describe the current U.S. Congress. The question is, where does the power come from, and what is the most corruptible power out there? The answer is simply that Congress can vote to give themselves a pay raise. There is very little impeding their path to getting a bigger paycheck each year. This process, whether you believe it or not, is actually constitutional, and has been happening since the current Constitution was ratified. However, there have been some major changes through the past 200 or so years. We can rectify the situation, however. The limit the room for corruption we need to remove the power to raise congressional pay away from Congress itself. Historically, there has always been an increase in Congressional pay. The first Congressmen were paid $6 per diem. This is because they were not career Congressmen, but had other jobs back home. As the years went on, …show more content…
We need to make Congress more accountable to the citizens of the United States. However, by placing that power directly in the hands of the citizens, there is no guarantee that anything productive can come from it, as there is always the chance that they are never allowed a pay raise, even when a standard of living change is necessary. With that in mind, I propose a constitutional amendment for a process similar amendment process for the Constitution. At the end of every session of Congress, that is every two years, a convention made up of 5 legislative members of each state, from state elections, not federal ones, will meet in Washington D.C. The names of these members will not be released to public knowledge until midnight of the day they convene, as to discourage bribery. During the course of this convention, the delegates will go through certain factors to decide if a pay raise is