Posted on 12/19/2009 12:07:21 AM PST by Dubya-M-DeesWent2SyriaStupid!
Why some environmentalists believe the president has the power to sidestep the Senate and commit the US to a global pact.
In 1997, in the Japanese city of Kyoto, the Clinton administration agreed to a groundbreaking treaty to combat global warming. And that's when the trouble started. The Senate had unanimously refused to approve the Kyoto Protocol, and in the end the Clinton administration didn't even submit it for a vote in the upper chamber. This made the US both the world's biggest polluter and, ultimately, the only industrialized nation to reject the accord. Now, as world leaders attempt to negotiate a new climate deal at Copenhagen, environmentalists want to avoid a repeat of the Kyoto debacle. That's why some green groups are urging Obama to do an end-run around the Senate and assert that his presidential powers empower him to commit the US to a climate treaty on his own.
Under Article II of the constitution, a president can sign an international treaty, but it must by ratified by two-thirds of the Senate before it becomes law. But there are also other types of international accords, like trade deals, that can be entered via a congressional-executive agreement, which requires only the approval of a simple majority in both houses of Congress. There’s no ironclad rule that determines which international pacts fall into which category. But neither route is easy. The last treaty to win ratification was the Strategic Offensive Reductions Treaty in 2002, which reduced the nuclear arsenals of Russia and US. Trade agreements are no picnic, either—the most recent pact approved was with Peru in 2007, while Bush administration deals with Colombia, South Korea and Panama are still languishing on Capitol Hill.
(Excerpt) Read more at motherjones.com ...
Sadly....
Yes by ego but no by constitution.
Can Obama sign the treaty .... yes. He can sign any document he wants to sign.
Does that then have the force of law an weight of a treaty by the mere act of his signing ... no. The Constitution and any act of Congress subject to the Constitution, still requires a 2/3rds majority to pass as a treaty.
He shall have Power, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, to make Treaties, PROVIDED TWO THIRDS OF THE SENATORS PRESENT CONCUR...”
The consitution is NOT merely advisory - it is the LAW OF THE LAND. PERIOD.
Gonna use the recent EPA ruling on CO2 to effect the change he wants, constitution be damned. Count on it.
According to the Constitution, no, but since Obama has pretty much trashed that document at this point, he intends to sign it by fiat.
No, a binding climate treaty could be entered into by way of an “Executive Agreement”.
Executive Agreements
In addition to treaties, which may not enter into force and become binding on the United States without the advice and consent of the Senate, there are other types of international agreements concluded by the executive branch and not submitted to the Senate. These are classified in the United States as executive agreements, not as treaties, a distinction that has only domestic significance. International law regards each mode of international agreement as binding, whatever its designation under domestic law.
The difficulty in obtaining a two-thirds vote was one of the motivating forces behind the vast increase in executive agreements after World War II. In 1952, for instance, the United States signed 14 treaties and 291 executive agreements. This was a larger number of executive agreements than had been reached during the entire century of 1789 to 1889. Executive agreements continue to grow at a rapid rate. The United States is currently a party to nearly nine hundred treaties and more than five thousand executive agreements.
The growth in executive agreements is also attributable to the sheer volume of business and contacts between the United States and other countries, coupled with the already heavy workload of the Senate. Many international agreements are of relatively minor importance and would needlessly overburden the Senate if they were submitted to it as treaties for advice and consent. Another factor has been the passage of legislation authorizing the executive branch to conclude international agreements in certain fields, such as foreign aid, agriculture, and trade. Treaties have also been approved implicitly authorizing further agreements between the parties. According to a 1984 study by the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, “88.3 percent of international agreements reached between 1946 and 1972 were based at least partly on statutory authority; 6.2 percent were treaties, and 5.5 percent were based solely on executive authority.”
http://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/common/briefing/Treaties.htm
See post # 8.
Yes they just call it an agreement or some other damn word.
How would that “Executive Agreement” work when Ogabe wants to hand over 100 billion dollars per year of the taxpayer’s money?
Never mind, the Congress would never let that happen /sarc
You all assume Obama follows tradition and laws. He doesn’t. He’s already made that apparent.
The Senate can even ratify something and pretend it's binding, but ...
Any legislation or treaty that is repugnant to the US Constitution is null and void at its inception. However, bureaucrats will pretend otherwise, even enforcing such at gunpoint, until the people take back their government.
It's way past time.
It too says he needs a 2/3 majority vote in the Senate, which is what everyone else is saying, myself included.
And who better to enforce this political agenda than Carol (former director of Socialists International) Browner, unconfirmed and unaccountable, Climate Change Commissar.
yitbos
All this climate foolishness just proves one thing... Trust placed in man and government is misplaced trust. Within the past month they have all proven themselves to be fools, and their leadership is a joke. (This includes all the world leaders across the board who bow at the altar of Climate Change to control people and make profit.)
There is only one place to place your Trust! And that is in God the Father, Jesus the Son and the Holy Spirit! Praise God!
I bet he thinks so.
I was very specific in my post and spoke of treaties not agreements. They are two separate things and agreements DO NOT become the “law of the land” as per stated in the Constitution.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find only things evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelogus
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