Signing Statements = Unlimited Authority. Any Problems?

As reported in the Washington Post yesterday, President Obama seems set on continuing one of the more odious power-grabbing actions perpetrated by presidents: signing statements.

Presidential signing statements are, as stated by the Congressional Research Service (CRS),

"...[O]fficial pronouncements issued by the President contemporaneously to the signing of a bill into law that, in addition to commenting on the law generally, have been used to forward the President’s interpretation of the statutory language; to assert constitutional objections to the provisions contained therein; and, concordantly, to announce that the provisions of the law will be administered in a manner that comports with the Administration’s conception of the President’s constitutional prerogatives."

In other words, when Congress passes a law with which the president disagrees, he can simply issue a "signing statement" which will outline just how (or, alternatively, whether) he intends to execute the law.

Or, in other, other words, if the president doesn't like a law, he doesn't bother with it.

For some reason, I do not think our Founding Fathers intended for anyone to flout the law with little, if any, repercussions.

According to the same CRS report, presidents have used signing statements since the 19th century, but George W. Bush accelerated their use to warp speed. By contrast, the popular view of President Obama is that he will refuse to issue any signing statements, as one of his many (loudly proclaimed) drastic changes from the previous administration.

Not so. Although Obama deplored the use of Bush's signing statements while he was campaigning, he certainly did not shrink -- when pressed -- from the potential use of signing statements, as evidenced by his campaign's response to a survey issued in 2007:

Signing statements have been used by presidents of both parties, dating back to Andrew Jackson. While it is legitimate for a president to issue a signing statement to clarify his understanding of ambiguous provisions of statutes and to explain his view of how he intends to faithfully execute the law, it is a clear abuse of power to use such statements as a license to evade laws that the president does not like or as an end-run around provisions designed to foster accountability.

I will not use signing statements to nullify or undermine congressional instructions as enacted into law. The problem with this administration is that it has attached signing statements to legislation in an effort to change the meaning of the legislation, to avoid enforcing certain provisions of the legislation that the President does not like, and to raise implausible or dubious constitutional objections to the legislation. The fact that President Bush has issued signing statements to challenge over 1100 laws – more than any president in history – is a clear abuse of this prerogative. No one doubts that it is appropriate to use signing statements to protect a president's constitutional prerogatives; unfortunately, the Bush Administration has gone much further than that.

As it turns out, in 2007, all 12 presidential candidates (Republican and Democratic) were surveyed about this very issue. Not surprisingly, Rudy Guiliani, Mike Huckabee, and Fred Thompson -- the most hawkish of the candidates -- refused declined to answer the question.

With the exception of those three, Barack Obama's response was -- far and away -- the most aggressive in favor of signing statements. (Not quite the ranking expected by his fervent, slavish followers who, lulled by his melodic voice, don't bother to analyze his words?)

When considering his response, one could take the position that Obama, who was a senior lecturer (not "professor," his self-promotion aside) in constitutional law, either understands the "proper" role of signing statements, or was in no way going to hobble himself if and when he became president. Since he's been a politician all of his life, and a lecturer only a small part of it, I think the Politician threw the Lecturer to the side of the road like one of his used cigarette butts.

This is not to cast aspersions on only Obama for his attitude toward signing statements. Former President Bush took that fairly narrowly-defined concept, and twisted it beyond recognition so that he was, literally, operating above the law. Many laws.

Signing statements are a corruption of power, and an example of how the Executive Branch now dwarfs the other two. If a president disagrees with a bill Congress sends his way to sign into law, Article I, Section 7 of the Constitution gives him authority to disagree.

(Yes, Mr. Bush, it's called a "veto" -- of course, that means that Congress could still overrule you. Nope, can't have that? How about you just sign every bill into "law," and then inform the lawmakers that their so-called "laws" matter to everyone in the country except your office. Nice and neat ... except for the troubling fact that our forefathers left England to escape people who did not believe that all men are created equal.)

And, if pesky Congress overrides the veto, you can always petition the Supreme Court as a citizen. (Article III, Section 2, in case you're wondering, Mr. President.)

We shall see if Obama starts to rachet down the over-reaching authority of the State, or if he tries the Imperial Presidency on for size, and finds he likes it.