Paradox of Self-Amendment by Peter Suber be deprived of its equal suffrage in the Senate." This may look like complete entrenchment, forbidding a certain type of amendment, but as noted in Section 8 it is actually incomplete. Amendments depriving some states of their equal suffrage in the Senate are not precluded if a particular, difficult procedure is used: getting the consent of each victim state. It may look self-entrenched as well, but in fact it only (explicitly) entrenches the rule (derived from Article I, §3.1) that the states shall have equal representation in the Senate; it does not entrench itself or forbid its own amendment. However, self-entrenchment is implied for most commentators, and justifiably to the extent that irreflexive entrenchment is pointless without self-entrenchment. The crudest way to infer self- entrenchment is to posit or assume complete self-entrenchment, even though the clause itself is merely an incomplete entrenchment clause. This was the approach of Justice Wayne in Dodge v. Woolsey, 59 U.S. 331, 348 (1855) when he referred to the equal suffrage limitation as one of two "permanent and unalterable exceptions to the power of amendment."[Note 18] It makes more sense to infer incomplete self-entrenchment at the same level of difficulty as the entrenchment of the protected rule. That means that the equal suffrage limitation could be repealed if every potential victim consented, which requires unanimity.[Note 19] Irreflexive entrenchment can be undone even under the inference model, for the disentrenching act is neither amending itself nor amending an entrenched section nor entrenched against amendment. Under the inference model complete immediate self-entrenchment may be as impossible to undo as complete mediate self-entrenchment. If the section of the AC that describes the power to amend is the power that is immediately self- entrenched, then it must, but cannot, repeal its entrenching language before it can perform any self-amendment. But if the part immediately self- entrenched is not the part describing the power to amend, then the latter part may apply irreflexively to the former and repeal the entrenching language and amend the underlying rule. This of course is not "self-amendment" except that both the amended and amending sections are part of the AC. If the language that entrenches the AC is outside the AC, then two possibilities arise that require separate treatment. First, if the entrenchment clause is not self-entrenched and not held to be self-entrenched, then it may seem to be repealable by ordinary amendment like any other unentrenched rule. It does not forbid its own amendment (ex hypothesi), but only forbids the amendment of the AC. If one interpreted the repeal of the clause as an amendment to the AC, because the AC will have divested itself of a limitation on its power, then one must consider the clause impliedly self-entrenched; if not, then it may obviously be repealed by ordinary amendment. Second, if it is self-entrenched or impliedly self-entrenched, then it is more difficult to dispose of. Even if self-entrenchment clauses are repealable by extraordinary procedures like transmutation (see Section 8.A), then a clause entrenching the AC and itself is still in a different class. In a case of "ordinary" transmutation, the rule to be repealed purports to be immutable and to prohibit the amendment that would repeal it. The AC might change itself prior to transmutation to give itself explicit power to repeal protective language as well as to give itself the benefit of recency (a tie- breaker under some canons of interpretation). But if the AC is prohibited to amend itself and if the prohibition also prohibits its own amendment, then the AC cannot acquire new, explicit language by self-amendment prior to self-amendment. Although the logic of this situation is more complex than ordinary entrenchment, and the barriers to repeal are more formidable, the overkill of insurmountable hurdles, the answer is the same as for ordinary disentrenchment: under the inference model the multiplication of impregnable walls simply reinforces the conclusion of irrepealability, while under the acceptance model repeal is permissible if accepted. The theory cited by a judge to uphold such disentrenchment might be more tortured and elliptical, and its implausibility might contribute to a climate in which acceptance fails to grow. In fact, and this is the sharp edge of the theory, the legal rationale might be self-contradictory, or illogical for some other reason, without thereby ceasing to articulate the acceptance of the people that authorizes the amendment. Moreover, the judge is not wholly without theories to cite, for she may appeal to the continuing omnipotence of the people, the undemocratic consequence of the rule of the living by the dead, the anti-democratic intention to bind future generations irrevocably, the perilous enhancement of revolution as a political option, and so on. She might also cite the precedents of complete entrenchment repealed or declared repealable, such as Opinion of the Justices, 263 Ala. 158, 81 So.2d 881 (1955), and McCullen v. Williamson, 221 Ga. 358, 144 S.E.2d 911 (1965).[Note 20] C. Self-disentrenchment of the AC What if a self-entrenched AC forbids not only the amendment of the AC but also the repeal of the entrenchment clause? We should assume that a clause that says anything like "this AC shall not be amended", when the clause is part of the AC, already forbids both. That condition is built into the definition of self-entrenchment. Logically, it may seem that an amendment that would repeal the entrenchment clause violates, not repeals, the language of the constitution. Indeed, that is how the formalist or inference model sees it, and this reading would be shared by even more legally sophisticated models of law that interpreted words of the constitution by their "plain meaning". But disentrenchment is permissible in New Mexico despite plain meaning and the logic of violation. In New Mexico the rule protected by an entrenchment clause was allowed to amend itself in violation of the clause, and the Attorney General gave an advisory opinion that the entrenchment clause could itself be repealed without any special procedure. Both these acts would seem to violate, not repeal, the clause, but they were declared permissible. A valuable perspective on the slippery and fundamental distinction between violation and repeal exists in the common law. Most cases sit atop a history of precedent that contains inconsistent rulings. No matter how the next court decides a case, it will be "violating" valid law in the form of some living precedent. Even if one denies that this is inevitable or frequent (see Section 21.B), one must acknowledge that it is permissible. Yet the decision that "violates" valid rules of case law is not a simple violation; it makes new law itself. That is part of the reason why it escapes nullification for its violation. (Another part of the reason is that the decision itself argues that the "violated" precedents were distinguishable, or inapplicable to 64