It is easy to sometimes feel small and insignificant in the grander scheme of things. Maybe especially when we are facing so many things out of our control as we find during the COVID-19 forced lockdown. It is almost like we have all been sent to our rooms and grounded. Those of us who have been deemed "essential" get to be on a form of work release, where we can work, but then must come back home while we are still grounded. But, you are much more powerful than you think. It is amazing what passion can do, be it a passion to change the world, or at least your world. That passion can be fueled by a dream of what can be, or it could be to prove someone was wrong about you.
This morning, while reading a speech from Supreme Court Justice, Neil Gorsuch, I heard the story of one seemingly insignificant college sophomore who made a huge change that went under the waterline of history. Highly significant, just not very well noticed. How familiar are you with the 27th Amendment of the United States Constitution? I am a history nut, and had no idea about this story.
The 27th Amendment was written by James Madison in 1789 and was intended to be ratified along with the original ten along with the Bill of Rights. However, it languished unratified for nearly two hundred years. That is until a 19 year young college sophomore, Gregory Watson, at the University of Texas was given an assignment in a course on government. He was to write a research paper so off to the library he went to find a topic, he looked through books on the Constitution.
"I'll never forget this as long as I live, I pulled out a book that has written in it a chapter of amendments that Congress has sent the state legislators, but which not enough state legislators approved in order to become part of the Constitution. And this one jumped right out at me."
Greg Watson
The Amendment provides that: "No law varying the compensation for the services of the Senators and Representatives, shall take effect, until an election of representatives shall have intervened."
This way, legislators could not pass a pay raise for themselves without having to face the voters so they could face the music so to speak if the voters were not okay with it.
The Amendment was ratified by a few states but not enough to ratify into law. Watson decided to write his research paper on the idea that this amendment could be dug up and still be ratified if enough states would get on board. The idea sounded ridiculous and his professor gave him a C for it. Watson, didn't believe he deserved a C and it made him mad enough to prove her wrong. Watson said, "I thought right then and there, I am going to get this thing ratified." And he went to war, writing state legislators and members of Congress to help him with their home states. Most of the replies were negative, if they replied at all. However eventually, a Senator from Maine passed the idea to a friend back home, and Maine ratified the amendment in 1982.
Watson, now really believed he could do this, and started a campaign of writing letters to every to every state legislator he thought might help. Soon, his campaign started to build momentum and several states would ratify the amendment every year. Finally in 1992, more than 200 years since James Madison had written it, and a decade after Watson wrote that fateful research paper, the 27th Amendment finally passed. By the way, when the professor found out, on March 1 2017, she filed paperwork to officially change that 1982 "C" into an A.
When asked why he did it, Watson said something that should inspire us all: "I wanted to demonstrate that one extremely dedicated, extremely energetic person could push this through. I think I demonstrated that." That's hard to argue with.
What might you do if you caught on fire inside for it?
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