Posted on 07/28/2006 1:58:24 PM PDT by quidnunc
There are some real black marks on President Bush’s record on abiding by his oath to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution. He signed a campaign-finance-regulation bill that he knew, at its core, exceeded the constitutional powers of the federal government. His approach to the constitutionality of governmental racial preferences has steadfastly avoided the temptations of principle. President Reagan regularly grounded the case for limited government in the Founders’ design; the notion seems alien to this president, who has therefore not even paid it lip service.
But the loudest complaints about Bush’s constitutional record are not ours. At the moment, those complaints center on the president’s allegedly unprecedented use of “signing statements” that announce his interpretation of laws as he signs them. Bush has supposedly altered the constitutional balance of power, illegitimately claimed a right to have the last word on matters of constitutional interpretation, and threatened the rule of law. The correct answer to this complaint is not that the ability to issue signing statements is a defensible and necessary presidential power. It is that it is hardly a power at all. The idea that Bush’s use of them has created a constitutional crisis is impossible to take seriously.
This week, a task force of the American Bar Association issued a report that takes it very seriously indeed: which is not surprising, considering that the task force was stacked with signing-statement hysterics. (The few Republican members of the task force were on record against signing statements at the time it was established.) Arlen Specter, the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, has introduced legislation to implement the task force’s recommendations. The bill orders the courts not to rely on signing statements in interpreting laws. It authorizes the courts to render verdicts on the legality of signing statements.
We have often disagreed with Senator Specter, but we have rarely found him loopy. That is what he is here.
Consider, first, the alternatives to presidential signing statements. Can presidents really be expected to veto every piece of legislation that contains unconstitutional elements? The ABA thinks so. But presidents throughout American history have thought otherwise. As Ed Whelan has pointed out on NRO, nearly “every appropriations bill contains a provision that violates Chadha [the Supreme Court’s decision on legislative vetoes]. The task force’s position would lead, at best, to an insane game of chicken between the President and Congress.” Should presidents, then, be expected to implement provisions they believe unconstitutional? No president has heretofore taken that position, which would make them obedient to a statute at the cost of being disobedient to the Constitution under which the statute was enacted.
-snip-
The President Not this particularly but any President) can write anything he wants to. Its when he actually violates the law or the consitution that its a problem - and in that case it doesn't really matter that he wrote his reasons down.
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I cant disagree with you on this point.
What is unconstitutional is what ever the Supreme Court says is unconstitutional.
What is unconstitutional is what ever the Supreme Court says is unconstitutional.
You misunderstand the Constitution. The supreme court issues opinions on cases of law & fact arising before it.
Enforcing the laws at issue are left to legislative & executive branches of State or Fed gov'ts; -- ~all~ officials of which are bound to support and defend the US Constitution as written, --- not as per the ~opinions~ of judges or other officials.
Thus the power of the 'law', and of all branches of gov't are continually checked & balanced by sworn individual officials & juries-; -- and if enough of these individual 'jurors', at any level of any branch, question the constitutional validity of specific 'laws', -- back they go to the USSC for further opinions.
That's how the system should work at least.. We all know that politically both sides are ignoring the constitution.
I really don't think that's too much to ask.
Remember that future Democratic presidents will also use this power to keep the Republicans in Congress "in check".
Quidnunc rarely comments he/she has a long history of not having an opinion.
TT
Whatnow? posts, watches, and provides an obscure or teasing comment. But He/She agrees because....
It all goes back to the Jefferson Administration and Madison Vs Marbury decided in 1803.
The Chief Justice of the Supreme Court ruled that just because John Madison (the Madison in Madison Vs Marbury) wrote the Constitution didn't mean he knew what it meant.
Neither Madison (then Secretary of State) who wrote the constitution or Jefferson (then president) who wrote the declaration of independence disputed Chief Justice John Marshalls ruling that the SUPREME COURT WAS THE FINAL ABRITOR of what what the words in the Constitution mean.
If you had only been there to tell Madison, Jefferson, and Marshall they were all wrong, I'll bet things would have been a lot different.
Ping
Is Specter setting the President up for impeachment if the RATS take control ?
To Texas from New Orleans
Sounds like a good move.
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