The latest news in this slow 4th-of-July week is that the Obama Administration has announced that it will not enforce the law mandating that employers provide health insurance coverage. This is not the first time the Administration has nullified a law in this way.
I could make a case that Congress should insist that the President enforce the law, or else face impeachment. The fact that this suggestion seems absurd says something about the state of the health care law. However, it says even more about the state of our Republic.
UPDATE: Charles Murray has a similar take.
Like James II. What could possibly go wrong?
Look… it’s Obamacare. His name is right there in the law. It’s his legislation, even if he tossed it over the wall to Pelosi and Reid to write it. So of course he can line-item change it after the fact.
What do you think this is? A constitutional republic?
We are now serfs under a totalitarian government. Gigantic laws are unreadable, except by politicians and courts who can find powers to do or not do anything. It only remains for our government to explore the many areas in which it wants to enforce compliance or sell indulgences.
We are left with the ability to elect the dictators over us, who will have total power until we elect the next dictators. This will go on while elections are permitted.
We are now serfs under a totalitarian government. Gigantic laws are unreadable, except by politicians and courts who can find powers to do or not do anything. It only remains for our government to explore the many areas in which it wants to enforce compliance or sell indulgences.
We are left with the ability to elect the dictators over us, who will have total power until we elect the next dictators. This will go on while elections are permitted.
We need the rule of law. Soon we will codify our situation so that all actions of the government are lawful and just.
The “Do the Right Thing” Bill
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Future news:
“Do The Right Thing” will give us open, consistent, dynamic government. It grants President Michelle Obama (now in her quite successful 3rd term in office) all principles and powers to consider all matters and then “Do the right thing”. The Congress retains the important function of advising on the President’s actions should she desire this.
The Congress is now free to do what it does best, arrange for hospital admissions, allocate liquor licenses, and grant carbohydrate waivers to restaurants.
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The larger question is, “How do we make the system work?” – that is – how do we avoid runarounds and loopholes that short-circuit the both the formal process and intent of the structure of the Constitution? “If they don’t like the law, then actor A should A1, not A2 or A3; actor B should B1, not B2 or B3, etc.”
A structure of limited government of separated powers was always going to make A1, B1, etc. difficult, and so it was inevitable that A2, B2, etc. would take their place, even if just for some solitary moment of expedience, but eventually to the undermining of the entire structure.
The American Constitutional enterprise was premised on a general distrust of government, even by those who governed. The Progressive enterprise is premised on a general trust of government. When we let the Progressive camel nose into the tent under Roosevelt, it doomed the American enterprise. The only cure is a new distrust, which perhaps we are starting to have, followed by a series of Constitutional amendments bringing the bureaucracy under control, restraining our Imperial Presidency, and repealing the 16th Amendment, which finances the Progressive enterprise.
This idea of “limited government” is, I think, improperly understood today. It did not mean that the power of government was limited, but rather, that the different parts of government had great power but only in limited areas.
The federal legislative component, for instance, had spending authority that was limited by the manner in which money could be raised and the things it could be spent on. The executive had great power to conduct war but not to start war. The judiciary could interpret law but not make law. The federal level controlled commerce between states, but not within them.
What has happened is that the constraints have been loosened or in some instances eliminated, but the power remains undiminished.
But the plan was not “limited government” except in the sense of “confined government”, as opposed to “weak government.”
Is “nullification” really your most charitable view of those with whom you disagree?
Are you familiar with the legal doctrine of prosecutorial discretion? Please check the comment by Jack Davis here: http://econlog.econlib.org/archives/2012/06/six_theses_on_e.html#211251