Can the People Themselves Still Amend the Constitution?

The American Promise coalition is determined to find out – and, in the process, rein in the big money playing havoc with our politics.

Boss Tweed depicted by Thomas Nast, Harper's Weekly, October 21, 1871. Source: Wikipedia.

Philanthropists worry about false positives – grants that don’t pan out in the way they had hoped and planned, or, even worse, that do more harm than good. In my time as a funder, I certainly extended grants that, in retrospect, turned out to be mistakes. But the decisions that trouble me the most are those I now recognize were false negatives – grants that I should have made, but did not.

In hindsight, one of the most prominent of these non-grantees was American Promise. It forms the vanguard of a coalition working to solve the myriad problems stemming from how big money sluices through and floods our politics. Their solution is so formal and old school it is actually refreshingly democratic. American Promise seeks to amend the Constitution. They might just succeed.

The For Our Freedom Amendment that the group backs has three simple provisions:

Section 1. We the People have compelling sovereign interests in the freedom of speech, representative self-government, federalism, the integrity of the electoral process, and the political equality of natural persons.

Section 2. Nothing in this Constitution shall be construed to forbid Congress or the States, within their respective jurisdictions, from reasonably regulating and limiting contributions and spending in campaigns, elections, or ballot measures.

Section 3. Congress and the States shall have the power to implement and enforce this article by appropriate legislation and may distinguish between natural persons and artificial entities, including by prohibiting artificial entities from raising and spending money in campaigns, elections, or ballot measures.

Should the amendment get the requisite two thirds majority in the House and Senate, then be ratified by three quarters of the states, it would override Citizens United. Congress and the states could once again regulate money in politics with practical effect.

I recently caught up with Jeff Clements, who sparked and continues to lead this push, to learn more about the coalition’s progress. Jeff came to this effort through some hard lessons he learned as an Assistant Attorney General in Massachusetts and then as a lawyer working on behalf of the state of Montana. He was struck by how a series of Supreme Court decisions, including but not limited to Citizens United, had hamstrung any attempt by the American people or their representatives to control the runaway campaign finance system.

During this period (the mid-2010s), most philanthropy in the democracy field, including the portion I was directing, backed some combination of two approaches. These included state level reform efforts and / or developing a new jurisprudence that would enable the regulation of campaign finance to pass muster with the Supreme Court. Such fixes were not slam dunks, but at least they would take years rather than decades to achieve. As impractical as it seemed at the time, at least to this grant maker, Clements and his colleagues at American Promise opted to take the much longer and harder road of amending the Constitution.

A decade later, their bet has turned out to be the smarter one. Most philanthropic funders and many advocates have long since given up on campaign finance reform. But American Promise has remained stalwart; it continues to build momentum behind its lofty and small “d” democratic aspiration to amend the Constitution. To help readers understand why and how they have gone about this, here is a transcript of my conversation with Jeff (lightly edited for clarity and brevity).

Daniel Stid: What makes money in politics such a difficult issue to solve?

Jeff Clements: Money in politics is not just another policy problem—it’s the problem that blocks progress on almost every other issue people care about. We’re dealing with a system where the incentives are stacked in favor of those who already have influence and resources. Politicians spend huge amounts of their time fundraising, and the people they’re hearing from most often are wealthy donors and lobbyists. That shapes priorities, access, and ultimately the laws that get written.

And the public knows it. Poll after poll shows overwhelming frustration with the role of money in politics. But cynicism is also part of the challenge. Many people feel the system is too rigged to change. That discourages action. The problem is deeply entrenched and self-reinforcing, which makes it one of the hardest to tackle—but also one of the most important.

Daniel Stid: Why did you choose the amendment route, given how hard it is?

Jeff Clements: Early on, I had to wrestle with this question. A lot of smart people were saying, “Let’s go back to the Supreme Court and try to get Citizens United overturned.” Others were saying, “Let’s pass state laws that push the envelope and see how far we can go.”

Based on my experience as a lawyer, neither of these approaches was going to get to a truly lasting solution. I was amazed that they were so widely supported. It was absolutely implausible to me that the Supreme Court was going to fix this, or allow others to fix it.

The Court has been very clear in its direction—it’s not backing away from the idea that money is speech and corporations have the same rights as individuals in this arena. So waiting for a different Court didn’t feel like a real plan. And state laws, while valuable, are always vulnerable to being struck down by the courts. That’s exactly what happened in Montana when their century-old anti-corruption law was swept aside.

A constitutional amendment, by contrast, resets the foundation. It says clearly that the people, through their elected representatives, have the authority to set reasonable limits on money in politics. That’s the only way to fix this problem that will last.

Daniel Stid: How do you build a movement for a constitutional amendment?

Jeff Clements: We’ve always believed that if you’re serious about changing the Constitution, you can’t do it from Washington, D.C. This has to be a people-powered movement. That means going state by state, community by community, and working with the folks who are closest to the ground.

We’ve partnered with advocates in more than 20 states, helping them build local coalitions that reflect their own political cultures. In some places, that’s student groups and faith organizations. In others, it’s veterans’ groups or civic associations. The point is to make this a locally-rooted effort that people feel ownership of, rather than something imported from the outside.

So we work through local groups like Rotary and Kiwanis clubs and the League of Women Voters—these groups are the connective tissue of civic life in America. They bring people together across differences, they have credibility in their communities, and they’re committed to service above self. Those are exactly the kinds of values we need in this movement.

When I talk with Rotary clubs, I don’t have to convince people that money in politics is a problem. They see it in their communities, whether it’s how resources get allocated or which voices get heard. What we offer them is a constructive way to channel that frustration into action. And because Rotary is everywhere—from big cities to small towns—that means the message travels into parts of the country that national groups sometimes overlook.

Daniel Stid: What have you learned from prior efforts to amend the Constitution?

Jeff Clements: One of the biggest lessons is patience. No constitutional amendment in our history has ever been quick or easy. Even popular ones have taken years, sometimes decades, of organizing and persistence. Think about women’s suffrage, or the civil rights amendments after the Civil War. These weren’t short-term campaigns; they were generational movements.

Another lesson is that success depends on building broad, cross-partisan coalitions. There is a lot of talk these days about bridging divides in the abstract. Our movement really is applied, goal-oriented bridging work. If an amendment gets cast as belonging to one party or ideology, it almost always stalls. But when it’s rooted in shared democratic values—fairness, accountability, equality of voice—that’s when it has staying power. That’s why we focus so much on building relationships in unexpected places, in red and blue states across the country.

Democracy is hard. It’s supposed to be. But it’s also resilient. When you look at the big changes in our history, they’ve almost always come through ordinary people organizing, persisting, and demanding a better future. That gives me confidence.

We have Republicans, Democrats, and Independents involved at every level. You can’t have conservatives pretending to talk progressive, or progressives pretending to talk conservative. You have to actually be the people you are and be authentic. One thing we do really well is let people speak for themselves, and make the case based on what is important for them.

Daniel Stid: Why are the states such an important battleground?

Jeff Clements: States are where constitutional amendments are either made or broken. Remember, it’s not enough to get two-thirds of Congress to propose an amendment—you also need three-quarters of the states to ratify it. That means 38 states have to say yes. If you wait until the end to start building state support, you’ve already lost.

To date, 23 states and more than 800 cities and towns have formally called on Congress to propose a constitutional amendment that would enable us to get big money out of politics. That’s remarkable progress, and what’s even more important is that these resolutions come from across the political spectrum. Some are from traditionally blue states like California and New York. But we also have support from red states like Montana and Utah. This isn’t a partisan issue—it’s a democracy issue.

That’s why we’ve put so much emphasis on state legislatures, governors, and grassroots networks. In some states, we’ve seen really inspiring bipartisan leadership. In states like Utah, Texas, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania, for example, you’ll have Republicans and Democrats standing side by side, saying we need to reclaim our democracy from big money. It’s powerful, and it shows this isn’t just a talking point—it’s something communities are demanding.

So you have to start in the states, and then Congress will follow. As we have built up momentum in the states, we have become very active in Washington too. What we hear in Congress informs what we are doing in the states, and vice versa.

Daniel Stid: What gives you confidence that an amendment can succeed?

Jeff Clements: When we ask Americans about it, the polling is through the roof. 90 percent of Americans say money in politics is not just an irritation or a problem, it is a threat to democracy. And three out of four support the amendment. So there is just an overwhelming consensus about this, and we are starting to see this in the votes we are getting in the states that call on Congress to act.

To be clear, we still have a long way to go. Democracy is hard. It’s supposed to be. But it’s also resilient. When you look at the big changes in our history, they’ve almost always come through ordinary people organizing, persisting, and demanding a better future. That’s what gives me confidence.

We’re not naïve about the obstacles. This will take years of work. But we’ve already seen momentum build in ways that would have been hard to imagine a decade ago. The fact that 23 states and hundreds of localities have already gone on record in support—that’s a foundation you can build on. And because it’s happening across red and blue states, it has the legitimacy and reach you ultimately will need to ratify and actually amend the Constitution.

The alternative is to keep patching the system with short-term fixes, only to see them undone the next time the Court rules or the political winds shift. That’s not good enough. If we want a democracy where everyone’s voice counts equally, we need to go to the root of the problem. And in our system, that means amending the Constitution.