An Imbalance of Power: the Beginning of Tyranny?

[Originally posted on goofyblog 8.16.06]

The conservative Salt Lake City Tribune has recently printed an editorial regarding Bush’s unprecedented use of signing statements, part of which reads:

The Constitution commands that the president “shall take care that the laws be faithfully executed.” There is no exception for laws with which the president disagrees. Despite this, some presidents have issued statements when they have signed bills into law declaring that they will not enforce certain provisions.

This ploy to ignore the law-making authority of Congress places in jeopardy the separation of powers that underlies the Constitution. It also places the president above the law. President George W. Bush has used signing statements far more than any other president, a record 800 times to date. Congress and the courts must rein in this presidential power grab. To do otherwise would be to court tyranny.

And an article in the June 22^nd issue of the New York Review of Books called “Power Grab” reads:

For five years, Bush has been issuing a series of signing statements which amount to a systematic attempt to take power from the legislative branch. Though Ronald Reagan started issuing signing statements to set forth his own position on a piece of legislation, he did it essentially to guide possible court rulings, and he only occasionally objected to a particular provision of a bill. Though subsequent presidents also issued such statements, they came nowhere near to making the extraordinary claims that Bush has; nor did they make such statements nearly so often.

Although, the power of the Congress has been eroding for years (e.g., Truman ignored Congress to go to war with Korea), the past 5 years have seen a distinct change. A too-docile Congress should be all the reason we need to vote a different breed of people in, if it’s not already too late.

“Authority once ceded is almost impossible to retrieve” Mickey Edwards says in his article, “Power Play” in this month’s Playboy Forum. “If the president. . .is guilty of malfeasance. . .by virtue of having ignored the Constitution, then Congress is equally guilty of nonfeasance. . .for failure to perform its constitutional duties. The US has survived presidential malfeasance before; congressional nonfeasance is a much more dangerous thing.”

In watching Bush give his pronouncements about going to war several years ago, what struck me was not his speech, but the “set” shown on the screen. The off-white background, the red carpet, an empty podium. Bush swept out, made his statement, then swept away. It all seemed so “roman.”
Do we have an Emperor now?

“If this were a dictatorship, it’d be a heck of a lot easier. . .just as long as I’m the dictator.”

-George W. Bush
December 18, 2000
during his first trip to DC
after his appointment by the Supreme Court.