Registered: Sep 2000
Location: The Bottom of the Toyem Pole
Posts: 9455

I was reading This Boston Globe article discussing how the President deems himself outside the purvey of the law in so many different cases. That alone gets me and many others upset, but what dawned on me and really worries me is what comes next. Now that Bush has established, unchallenged, that the President doesn't have to follow the laws and isn't required to submit to Congress and can just say that he can pick and choose Constitutional interpretation, what will future administrations do along the same lines?

Did Bush break the "checks and balances" system that have served us so well? If you suggest he hasn't, please explain to me how allowing him to do what he is doing, unopposed and unchecked, will not impact future president's desire and intention to do the same type of thing.

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Registered: Aug 2001
Location: Hilbert Space
Posts: 35669

I would think that, if his 'signing statements' get tested in court, they'll fail.

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Registered: Jul 2000
Location: Location Location
Posts: 26420

Good legal take on it/

Good CATO take on it, and other things.

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Registered: Sep 2000
Location: The Bottom of the Toyem Pole
Posts: 9455

quote:

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Originally posted by Paint CHiPs
Good legal take on it/

Good CATO take on it, and other things.

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Registered: Jul 2000
Location: Location Location
Posts: 26420

New York Times picks up on it:

quote:

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President Bush doesn't bother with vetoes; he simply declares his intention not to enforce anything he dislikes. Charlie Savage at The Globe reported recently that Mr. Bush had issued more than 750 "presidential signing statements" declaring he wouldn't do what the laws required. Perhaps the most infamous was the one in which he stated that he did not really feel bound by the Congressional ban on the torture of prisoners.

In this area, as in so many others, Mr. Bush has decided not to take the open, forthright constitutional path. He signed some of the laws in question with great fanfare, then quietly registered his intention to ignore them. He placed his imperial vision of the presidency over the will of America's elected lawmakers. And as usual, the Republican majority in Congress simply looked the other way....

Like many of Mr. Bush's other imperial excesses, this one serves no legitimate purpose. Congress is run by a solid and iron-fisted Republican majority. And there is actually a system for the president to object to a law: he vetoes it, and Congress then has a chance to override the veto with a two-thirds majority.

That process was good enough for 42 other presidents. But it has the disadvantage of leaving the chief executive bound by his oath of office to abide by the result. This president seems determined not to play by any rules other than the ones of his own making. And that includes the Constitution.

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