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By SHARON KILPATRICK
Rappahannock Neva Staff Writer
With the primary season at an end, former Sen. Eugene McCarthy was at work last weekend writing an essay on the case against a balanced budget amendment and other efforts to amend the constitution.
He told a story. In 1857 Minnesota was preparing to become a state instead of a territory. There was considerable debate on whether to move the capital from St. Paul to St. Peter. The territorial legislature passed a bill to move the capital to St. Peter, but Joe Rolette, a member of the legislature, stole the bill and ran off and hid for a week so the governor couldn’t sign it, and St. Paul remained the capital of the new state. St. Peter got the state mental hospital as a consolation prize, Sen. McCarthy said.
“The Constitution needs a Joe Rolette to hide it until the urge to amend it goes away,” he added.
“We can’t be amending the constitution for every problem,” he added. He finds the balanced budget amendment particularly objectionable. “You can’t make it automatic; they’ve been trying since the 1970s. It’s part of no-fault fiscal policy, like no-fault politics. They keep blaming it on
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