Remember the European Constitution that failed a few years ago? (At least the three hundred page document that they were calling a constitution.) I was shocked when my German friends mentioned that the German people would certainly have voted no, but they never got the chance. The German legislature voted for it, and that was it. Apparently most Europeans had no direct vote up or down for that constitution. And when it finally failed, it came from one of the countries that got a direct referendum.

But then thinking back to the US Constitution, it was voted in by the state legislatures without a direct vote, too. Somehow that seems OK back then, but an affront to democracy in today's world. How times change.