Hold Your Congressmen
Accountable for Their Freedom Index Votes In order to preserve our freedom
under the Constitution, We the People must hold our elected
representatives and senators in Congress accountable for their votes
on key issues. One good tool for doing that is "The Freedom Index: A
Congressional Scorecard Based on the U.S. Constitution," which is
published twice a year by The New American
magazine.
Each issue of the "Freedom Index" scores all 435
representatives and all 100 senators on ten key votes based on their
adherence to constitutional principles of limited government, fiscal
responsibility, national sovereignty, and a traditional foreign
policy of avoiding foreign entanglements.
The third "Freedom
Index" for the 112th Congress was published in the July 9, 2012
issue of The New American. The scores are derived by
dividing a Congressman’s constitutional votes (pluses) by the total
number he cast (pluses and minuses) and multiplying by 100.
Therefore the constitutionally best score is a 100 percent and the
worst score is 0 percent. The average House score for this index
(votes 21-30) is 47 percent, and the average Senate score is 43
percent. Three Senators — Mike Crapo and Jim Risch of Idaho, and
John Cornyn of Texas — earned 100 percent, but no one in the House
did.
Please click here to view the current "Freedom Index" and
look up your representative and senators to see how well they
scored. If you need to look up who your representative is based on
your address, click here.
Next, send an email to your representative and
senators and let them know whether you approve or
disapprove of their votes.
Of course, if one of your
congressmen scores a 100 percent, let him know you approve of his
performance (assuming you agree with the scoring, of course).
However, a score of 90 percent or below means that they voted
against the constitution one or more times. Be sure you let them
know in your message that you disapprove of their incorrect votes,
and ask them why they voted the wrong way. We'll be sending the same
message to all three of your congressmen, so be sure to include a
message to all three in the email we send for you. If you've looked
up the score for all three, be sure to mention each congressman by
name with their corresponding score. Nonetheless, we have written
the message in a generic way, just in case you don't have time to
look up the individual scores.
Thanks.
Your Friends at
The John Birch Society |