An Open Letter to the Congressional Republicans
Are You All OK with Giving Up Your Power to This Regime?
Dear Congressional Republicans,
This can’t have escaped your attention—the constitutional crisis brought on by the refusal of this administration to abide by judicial orders, even rulings of the Supreme Court.
The founders, in their wisdom, created three separate branches of government, and made congress slightly more powerful than the other two. They did this because the entire American project was in rejection of monarchy.
And now we have a president who would be king.
This Supreme Court, almost a creature of the current president, has finally woken up to the usurpation of power that this administration is in the process of carrying out. Finally, at long last, they are making rulings based on law and not servility. And this administration is IGNORING them.
Will your branch not do the same? It shouldn’t matter that the executive branch is held by your own party. What should matter is upholding democracy and the rule of law. What should matter is the well-being of your own constituents, who rely on a stable federal government for their basic needs. Not just the entitlements either, but also safe food, clean water, a decent education for their children, a medical infrastructure, and so much more.
All of these are being dismantled by the wrecking crew masquerading as federal administration.
As long as your party within congress abrogates its essential responsibility by rubber-stamping all demands from this administration, it never runs the risk of a similar show-down such as is happening now when the administration ignores judicial orders. Would they also ignore laws and oversight by congress, if congress ever sought to challenge them?
Thus far, we have no way to know for sure. Your body has chosen instead to let your power be sapped away by the executive. Eventually there will be nothing left to congress but the pro forma stamp of a false legitimacy.
In ancient Rome, before the advent of the Emperors, there was a powerful Senate that comprised the government of all Roman lands. The Roman Republic ended when Julius Caesar crossed the Rubicon and hailed himself dictator.
The Roman Senate still existed, as an enfeebled shadow of its former greatness. It is clear to all with eyes to see that the MAGA gang has crossed the Rubicon. What are you going to do? Follow the crowd to oblivion as the Roman Senate did two millennia ago? Or stand up and govern as the citizens you represent have the right to expect?
Sincerely,
Annabel Ascher, Citizen of the United States of America
Well said. Please post on Facebook? Everyone should read this.
Have you heard a recent piece by Laurie Anderson "Waiting for the Barbarians"? I play it over and over, because it feels like what is happening. https://youtu.be/MEoiyKzwN7A?si=5P9IfJIQOiaJzsdw
Annabel Asher: You state the case exactly right.
It seems that the main problem in the American Republic is the unbalancing of the three branches, heavily weighting the other two branches -- the Legislature and the Judiciary -- under the tonnage of a Plenary Executive.
From my own review of history, traces of this centralization of power originated with President Andrew Jackson, which is somewhat understandable in the role the Congress placed in elevated his predecessor, John Quincy Adams, to the Presidency, when Mr. Jackson had won the popular vote.
Certainly, concentration in the executive may be found in the Presidency of FDR for the New Deal, but especially President Harry S Truman both in his attempts to unilaterally crush the steel strike and, for the first time -- to my knowledge -- in American History, setting the Precedent with the Korean War of bypassing the Congress. This Precedent has been followed ever since with the Vietnam War and the various wars in the Middle East.
Under the Administration of George W. Bush, the Doctrine of the "Unitary Executive" went on steroids, and we are living under the consequences and the dominance of that subversive theory. See:
https://markrozell.gmu.edu/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/Rozell_and_Sollenberger_UE_and_Bush_Legacy_Chapter_2013.pdf
The only solution is, as you well point out, Congressional intervention to assert its Article I powers and to strengthen the Article III powers of the Judiciary to weaken the monopolistic exercise of powers under Article II by the Presidency.
When this occurs . . .
And ONLY when this occurs, will Presidential elections cease to be the fire-alarm, Code-Blue life alert that Presidential elections today are.
We cannot have a situation, as we have had for scores of years, where we hold our breath for the survival of nation and liberties hanging on which of two fallible human beings is to be elected as President.
We need a situation where both Congressional Parties battle for the middle, and majorities keep shifting in the House and Senate, and where the Legislature and the Judiciary are so very strong that it will be of consequence only at the margins, who is elected President.
Until Constitutional balance is restored, we will be always catching our breath and mourning over the possible loss of our democracy and our freedoms.