Thread: Signing Statements & Executive Orders: Obama's Tyrannica

Signing Statements & Executive Orders: Obama's Tyrannical Tack | Print | E-mail
Written by Joe Wolverton, II
Monday, 15 February 2010 19:45
The New York Times reported February 12 that President Obama was fed up trying to convince, cajole, and compromise with the Republican Party in order to garner its rubber-stamp enshrinement of his legislative legacy. So, in his exasperation, he will contradict himself yet again and begin ruling by fiat.

Although candidate and erstwhile populist Candidate Obama criticized (and rightly so) former President Bush for his dictatorial usurpation of legislative power via the signing statement, President Obama's own personal experience with the mounting congressional resistence to his agenda has given him second thoughts about the utility of these controversial codas.

As was further reported by The New American, President Obama has decided to sidestep congressional impediments to the achievement of his legislative goals by using executive orders and signing statements.

A presidential signing statement is a pronouncement that the president appends to a bill he signs into law. Nowadays, this executive addendum sets forth the President’s understanding of the law and gives guidance to the myriad departments under the executive branch umbrella on how to carry out the requirements of the new legislation.

Signing statements change the laws, revoking parts of them or adding provisions to them, at the same time redefining the Constitution and nullifying its checks and balances. Using them, the President assumes all power — executive, legislative, and judicial — unto himself and does so in a manner that is beyond question, beyond debate, beyond vote, and thus beyond the reach of the American people.

Constitutionally speaking, if a President does not like a piece of legislation, the only recourse allowed him is a veto. Modern Presidents, however, have two self-perpetuating habits that obviate the use of veto: engorging themselves with power not delegated to them by the Constitution and disregarding the Constitution altogether.

Given the recent run of success that previous Presidents have enjoyed with “signing statement as law of the landâ€

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.