President Donald Trump is testing the limits of presidential authority. From his use of the National Guard to quell crime, to the imposition of tariffs without congressional approval, to the bombing of Venezuelan boats trafficking illicit drugs into the United States, Trump’s actions raise legitimate constitutional questions.
The left believes this makes Trump a “fascist” and an “authoritarian.” They call him a “king.” Illinois Governor JB Pritzker is fond of the word “thug.” Sen. Adam Schiff just called him an “extortionist.” Trump is Hitler. Trump is Mussolini. Blah, blah, blah.
Name-calling is the last resort of people who have lost the argument. It’s lazy, and when using words like “fascist” and “racist,” it’s irresponsible, but there is no shortage of lazy, irresponsible people who find mindless invective appealing.
Both political parties target the naive and gullible. Go to any social media site and you’ll find the ravings of lots of lazy, irresponsible people parroting talking points both parties paid consultants big bucks to develop.
Politicians are constantly feeding their base a string of epithets they can use to attack their political opponents, and day after day you’ll find the party faithful venting their frustrations online.
They have been programmed to spew hate, and that’s exactly what they do.
However, beneath the puerile name-calling, there are serious questions about the limits of presidential authority. Fortunately, the founders created a government in which each of its branches has the ability to check the power of the other two.
By design, each branch is in a never-ending power struggle with the other two. This struggle creates a tension that keeps the whole system in equilibrium.
If Trump is exceeding his authority as president, he is not the first president accused of doing so.
Did Franklin Roosevelt have the authority to intern Japanese Americans after Pearl Harbor? Did George W. Bush have the authority to approve warrantless wiretapping of American citizens following the Sept. 11 attacks? Did Abraham Lincoln have the authority to suspend the writ of habeas corpus during the American Civil War, something for which his critics called him a tyrant?
Machiavelli was right when he said, “Whoever desires to found a state and give it laws, must start with assuming that all men are bad and ever ready to display their vicious nature, whenever they may find occasion for it.” The founders took Machiavelli’s advice, and despite the best efforts of both parties to delegitimize the institutions the founders devised to protect us from our worst instincts, the checks and balances they embedded within the Constitution are still functioning as intended.
The Supreme Court still has the final say on the constitutionality of a president’s actions, and Congress still has the power of the purse. Congress can pass laws anytime it wishes to rein in the authority of the president. The fact that it hasn’t doesn’t mean American democracy is dying. It just means the American people haven’t chosen to elect a sufficient number of members of Congress with a desire to do so.
But the American public is now being conditioned by unscrupulous office holders to measure the effectiveness of those constitutional restraints solely in terms of political outcomes. In other words, if you can’t get what you want, the system must be broken.
If the Supreme Court rules in a way a partisan doesn’t like, what good is it? How a law or presidential action squares with the Constitution is becoming irrelevant. Both parties have shown a willingness to undermine the legitimacy of the court if it’s in their political self-interest to do so.
That is the real threat to American democracy.
Both parties claim any judicial decision that thwarts their political objectives is proof the court is corrupt.
Standing before a crowd of protesters, angry over a case before the court that put abortion rights in jeopardy, Senator Chuck Schumer threatened the justices, saying, “I want to tell you, Gorsuch, I want to tell you, Kavanaugh: You have released the whirlwind and you will pay the price. You won’t know what hit if you go forward with these awful decisions.”
For his part, President Trump doesn’t limit his contempt for the judiciary to the Supreme Court alone. Any judge who rules against him is fair game. He’s threatened to break up the Ninth Circuit Court. He’s threatened to impeach judges who rule against him. He has labeled judges standing in his way as rogue insurrectionists and radicals.
Both the left and the right have placed partisan ambition above principle, and both left and right are willing to use scorched-earth tactics to achieve their desired ends.
But if the public loses faith in its government institutions because politicians found it convenient to undercut their legitimacy, it won’t matter who wins politically, or what course we chart for ourselves as a nation.
In 1959, Allen Drury, in his highly praised Pulitzer Prize-winning novel “Advise and Consent,” wrote, “Democracy is the most fragile thing on earth, for what does it rest upon? You and me, and the fact that we agree to maintain it. The moment either of us says we will not, that’s the end of it. It doesn’t rest on anything but us.”
It remains to be seen if Americans are willing to maintain their democracy by adhering to the principles on which it was founded, or if we will sell our collective birthright on the alter of political expediency.
Chris Roemer resides in Finksburg. He can be contacted at chrisroemer1960@gmail.com.