The following was originally published on KOB4 New Mexico. They covered a recent Convention of States event featuring Mark Meckler.
There's a movement underway that would turn the power structure of our government upside-down.
One of the leaders of this grass-roots effort was in Albuquerque Saturday meeting with New Mexicans.
The project is called The Convention of States.
Most of U.S. citizens know that congress can propose amendments to our constitution.
But article five also gives states the power to bypass the feds and call their own convention.
"The beast is too big in D.C.,” said Mark Meckler one of the project leaders. “We have to bring it back home and deal with it as people in our localities and states.”
Meckler is familiar to conservatives who know him as the founder of the tea party patriots. But he says it would be a mistake to label this as a conservative movement.
“When you really talk to people, left or right, we might use different language but we want the same things. When I speak to folks in Berkley California or maybe a place like Taos, we're going to talk about local control.” Meckler said.
If two-thirds of states pass the same language, they can convene their own constitutional convention and debate and vote on amendments
So far four states have approved. The New Mexico state house passed the language last year, but it died in the Senate.
Nearly 200 New Mexicans are gathered at the Marriott uptown to organize and get their message out.
"We have no evidence in our history of the federal government ever restraining its own power, so if people are going to put the government back in the bottle, which the majority of Americans think needs to happen, only we can do that,” Meckler said.
