Creating and developing rational, socially sustainable policies that address the interests of diverse groups cannot be done any longer at the level of a national congress.  The reasons are obvious, as the last 10-20 years have proven.  Because of the influence of corporate lobbies, state and national legislative processes have become intractably frozen where social policy development is excluded from serious discussion. 
 
The initiation of democracies has always come from the People.  So, too, the evolutionary development of existent democratic processes must emanate from the activity of the People.  Because violent social, political and economic/financial revolution destroys the historic achievements of democratic progress, violence is not the way.  Such actions almost always cause the development of martial law.  

Review:  The intention to motivate the evolution of an existing democratic process will almost never be accomplished through existing, invested democratic hierarchies of authority, power and control; and neither will it occur through violent revolution.  The rational option is for citizens at local community levels to initiate the work necessary to design an evolved form of democratic process.  Such a thought is not an errant idealistic vision — there exists a proven method for local community teams to begin designing validated sustainable social policies, and to develop evolved forms of democratic institutions that benefit citizen participation and benefit the legislative process. 
 
Perhaps the greatest stumbling block to the evolutionary development of any existing democracy is not the complacency of citizens, but their self-disempowerment.  In discussions I have had with educated people who have a sincere concern for their city, state or nation is that they truly believe that they have no power.  Hmmmm, sounds like a self-fulfilling prophecy to me! 
 
It may appear that I have painted myself into a corner with the development of this topic over the last few Posts.  Au contraire!  The wonderful aspect of the American Declaration of Independence and Constitutions is that it is immensely flexible and elastic for inventing democratic adaptations of existing processes.  It is simply a matter of interpretation because the Declaration is founded on universal values very, very similar to the values that have sustained our species for over a quarter million years.  This nation would not have lasted as long as it has if it had been founded on values less universal than those of our species.