| Page 2 of 5 < > |
Congress v. Bush
A New York Times editorial this morning states: "The A.B.A. called Mr. Bush's use of presidential signing statements 'contrary to the rule of law and our constitutional system of separation of powers' and recommended that Congress enact legislation clarifying the issue.
"We agree on both points, even though we fear that if Congress passes a bill, Mr. Bush will simply issue a new signing statement saying he also does not intend to follow it."
Hamdan Revisited
  Save & Share |
Saving options
Georgetown University Law Professor David Cole writes in the New York Review of Books to remind us of the significance of the Supreme Court's Hamdan decision.
"The Justice Department has maintained that the President can order torture, notwithstanding a criminal statute and an international treaty prohibiting torture under all circumstances. President Bush has authorized the National Security Agency to conduct warrantless wiretapping of American citizens, despite a comprehensive statute that makes such surveillance a crime. He has approved the 'disappearance' of al-Qaeda suspects into secret prisons where they are interrogated with tactics that include waterboarding, in which the prisoner is strapped down and made to believe he will drown. He has asserted the right to imprison indefinitely, without hearings, anyone he considers an 'enemy combatant,' and to try such persons for war crimes in ad hoc military tribunals lacking such essential safeguards as independent judges and the right of the accused to confront the evidence against him.
"In advocating these positions, which I will collectively call 'the Bush doctrine,' the administration has brushed aside legal objections as mere hindrances to the ultimate goal of keeping Americans safe. It has argued that domestic criminal and constitutional law are of little concern because the President's powers as commander in chief override all such laws; that the Geneva Conventions, a set of international treaties that regulate the treatment of prisoners during war, simply do not apply to the conflict with al-Qaeda; and more broadly still, that the President has unilateral authority to defy international law. In short, there is little to distinguish the current administration's view from that famously espoused by President Richard Nixon when asked to justify his authorization of illegal, warrantless wiretapping of Americans during the Vietnam War: 'When the President does it, that means that it is not illegal.'
"If another nation's leader adopted such positions, the United States would be quick to condemn him or her for violating fundamental tenets of the rule of law, human rights, and the separation of powers. But President Bush has largely gotten away with it, at least at home, for at least three reasons. His party holds a decisive majority in Congress, making effective political checks by that branch highly unlikely. The Democratic Party has shied away from directly challenging the President for fear that it will be viewed as soft on terrorism. And the American public has for the most part offered only muted objections.
"These realities make the Supreme Court's decision in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, issued on the last day of its 2005-- 2006 term, in equal parts stunning and crucial."
Quoting Dellinger
As washingtonpost.com legal blogger Andrew Cohen notes, "making the rounds on conservative blogs is a 1993 memo by then Justice Department attorney Walter Dellinger who offered a defense of signing statements for his President, Bill Clinton."
Similarly, at the Senate Judiciary hearing last month, Justice Department official Michelle E. Boardman repeatedly cited Dellinger's work in the Bush administration's defense. So did Tony Snow , at a press briefing.
But Dellinger himself shot back the next day, on Slate: "The problem is not the president's assertion that he can ignore laws he believes to be unconstitutional. The problem is what laws he believes to be unconstitutional. . . .
"The problem has been what those presidential signing statements say -- even worse, what the legal opinions intended to be secret assert. They claim that laws whose validity has never been seriously questioned are unconstitutional based on extravagant and untenable theories of presidential power."
Specter Watch
Even as Specter's new proposal establishes him as a potential hero to those trying to limit Bush's executive power grab, the senator is still considered a goat by that bunch when it comes to his proposal regarding Bush's domestic spying program.