Obama isn't the first president to abuse the clause to appoint nominees that the Senate wouldn't confirm. He is, however, the first to invoke the power when the Senate was—according to its own rules—actually in session. The White House called the "pro forma" sessions adopted by then-Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid "a procedural trick" aimed at unjustly stifling his ability to bypass Senate confirmation.
What President Obama doesn't seem to understand or accept is that our three branches of government are designed to thwart each other at least as much as complement each other. Not only are powers distributed among them, but they are designed so A) each is supreme within its domain, and B) each can thwart the other branches.
If the Senate enacts rules to extend their session to thwart recess appointments, that's part of their balancing power, because they are supposed to confirm appointments and when a mechanism is being used specifically to avoid that, then they have a responsibility to stop it.
Under the Constitution, no branch of government, no official has the power to say when the Senate is in session but the Senate.
By clearly disregarding the Senates own statement of its status, the President was committing an impeachable offense.
Sadly nobody in the legislative branch seems to have the courage to draw up articles of impeachment.
If Obama wanted to approach the problem legitimately, he would have gone to the Supreme Court to see if the Senate's rules regarding their sessions were unconstitutional. Of course, the court would probably have declined to take such a case, as the Senates actions are so clearly constitutional. Obviously, Obama didn't want to hear that.
The only power we, as citizens have, is the ballot box. We've got to start electing Senators and Representatives who aren't afraid of Presidential power and who are willing to impeach when necessary.
Remember, impeachment isn't a finding of guilt, it's just a finding that something needs to be put to trial. It's the only power outside election that can thwart a President who refuses to adhere to the constitutional limits of his office.
Of course, Congress itself is no big fan of constitutional limits. Witness its egregious abuse of the commerce and general welfare clauses (abetted by the Supreme Court, who has made violating the constitution with the "presumption of constitutionality" precedent the standard way of doing business). That's why they won't act, they are afraid that if they start invoking constitutional limits on the President, someone might think of applying them to Congress.
Again, our only direct power (short of the ammo box) is the ballot box. We need to elect Representatives who understand the limitations of their branch, and adhere to it, and we need to vote out those that don't, even when their violations are favorable to us individually.
We need to elect Presidents who know their place, and who appoint judges that aren't slaves to unconstitutional precedents -- the idea that "we've been doing it wrong so long we're bound to keep doing it wrong because it's a precedent").
We need to return appointment of Senators to the state legislatures to keep the federal government from running roughshod over the states.
And, ideally, there'd be more requirements to vote than merely being a citizen over 18 and having a pulse.
No comments:
Post a Comment