Re: Overtures proposing to make changing the PCUSA Constitution harder

Dear Editor:

The proposal to allow amendments to the Book of Order once every 5 years is probably the best of the lot. The others are probably too restrictive and will come back to bite their backers if actually passed.

The problem is that the Book of Order as currently written includes both the fundamental rules, what we think of as a constitution in the governmental sense, together with much that is not fundamental and better classified as "legislation". If we could separate the fundamental from the legislation, we could make it substantially harder to change the fundamentals, but the recent experience with trying to simplify the ordination section shows how difficult that will be. If even the simplest changes require 2/3 vote of the GA, or the Presbyteries, very little will get done. Conservatives might think they like the Book of Order as it is and want no MORE changes, but I doubt that is likely to be true forever.

An alternative approach would be to require that 2 successive GA's pass the identical proposed amendment by a majority vote, and adopt a rule that only one amendment on the same topic be considered at a time. That would give time for more adequate debate before we get to Presbytery votes, and also give time for the subsequent assembly to prevent ill-conceived proposals from going to the Presbyteries. It would also give at least a year off between amendments on the same topic, make it a little more difficult to amend the Constitution, and allow for greater time for reflection on any changes.