WRITTEN BY TREY GOWDY SC- Process matters. If ever you doubt this, talk to police officers or prosecutors. Both are members of the executive branch with sworn duties to execute the law. Police officers who do not meet even technical requirements of the Fourth Amendment have evidence excluded. Even if a suspect committed precisely the crime suspected, and even if the confession was freely and voluntarily given, confessions are thrown out if the Fifth Amendment is not followed. How and why is it different when the chief of the executive branch — the president — fails to follow the law? The Constitution gives each branch particular duties and powers. One of the primary duties of the executive branch, by and through the president, is to “take care that the laws be faithfully executed.” What does it mean to execute the laws and how is that meaning even more amplified considering the Framers added the word “faithfully”? [See a collection of political cartoons on Obamacare.] As senator, President Obama warned against executive overreach: “These last few years we’ve seen an unacceptable abuse of power at home. ... We’ve paid a heavy price for having a president whose priority is expanding his own power. The Constitution is treated like a nuisance.” How things have changed since 2007. As president, Obama has taken a different view, saying, “Where Congress won’t act, I will.” His rhetoric is not the only thing that’s different; we have seen his administration rewrite laws while circumventing Congress, decide to not enforce entire provisions of laws and ignore constitutionally mandated Congressional oversight. For example: Last year, the administration announced it would delay the employer mandate — a central provision to the Affordable Care Act — for one year. The law gave the administration no such authority to do so. The law states employers who do not provide health care coverage will incur penalties, and they “shall apply to months beginning after December 31, 2013.” If the president can modify health care law so long as his motives are good, can he modify other categories of the law? If not, why not? In August 2013, Attorney General Eric Holder announced the Department of Justice would no longer inform judges of the drug amounts in cases, thereby obviating mandatory minimum sentencing statutes. Never mind Congress passed these laws 20 years ago, and prosecutors and judges have used them since. So long as our motives are good and our intentions laudable, what difference does the boring language of the actual statute make? In 2012, President Obama ignored the Senate’s constitutional duty of “advise and consent” and moved ahead with four controversial appointments, even though the Senate was not in recess. He ignored previous legal precedent and his own administration’s analysis of what constitutes a “recess” to subvert a constitutionally mandated Congressional responsibility. The Court of Appeals has already held that the president exceeded his authority. Undeterred, his administration petitioned the United States Supreme Court for redress. We have heard the common refrain: President Bush did it, too. Are we really willing to argue because one executive overreached in the past, we should allow the continuation of this practice? Candidate Obama said, “The biggest problems that we’re facing right now have to do with George Bush trying to bring more and more power into the executive branch and not go through Congress at all. And that’s what I intend to reverse when I’m president of the United States of America.” [See a collection of editorial cartoons on the IRS Scandal.] This, somewhat ironically, is the same president who came into the House Chamber and exclaimed he would go forward with or without Congress. Executive overreach is not justified regardless of which party does it. Our Framers gave us a carefully calculated balance wherein they perceived members of the different branches would fight strenuously to preserve this delicate balance. Process matters. Good intentions do not trump plainly worded statutes. If you do not like a law, work with Congress to change it or change those who are thwarting your efforts. We are not a nation of good intentions. We are a nation of laws worthy of an executive who will execute them — faithfully.
Posted on: Sat, 22 Mar 2014 22:31:34 +0000
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