Congressional power, ending with a whimper, not a bang? |
On the eve of the 250th anniversary of a revolution launched to secure Americans’ right to democratic self-government, our representatives in Congress are so caught up in partisan gamesmanship that they are about to relinquish what little remains of their constitutional authority to an autocratic president and an unprincipled Supreme Court.
On their watch, what we think of as the American form of government, with its shared power and checks and balances, will come to an inglorious end, not with a bang but a whimper.
Over the past year, members sat back and did nothing as a president abolished agencies and programs created by Congress, refused to spend appropriated funds, arrogated to himself the power to set tariffs, launched a war to take control of Venezuela, abrogated congressionally approved treaties, ordered departments and agencies to stop enforcing certain statutes, demolished government property, and fired without cause or due process hundreds of thousands of government employees protected by civil service laws and scores of Senate-confirmed agency heads and board members serving unexpired terms.
Meanwhile, in all but a few cases, the Supreme Court refused to enjoin these encroachments on Congress’ constitutional authority, despite lower court rulings that the rationales for such actions lacked legal or factual basis.
In clearing a path for Donald Trump’s reelection, the nation’s highest court had already conjured from thin air the right of all future presidents to arbitrarily and corruptly use their powers to reward friends, punish enemies and line........