CNN.com – ABA: Bush violating Constitution – Jul 24, 2006
A little while back I wrote about how some people thought President Bush’s signing statements might be overstepping the bounds of his position:
Honestly, when you have prominent Republicans like Specter saying that our Republican President is overstepping his bounds, we’re all in trouble.
And now the American Bar Association, which might know a thing or two about the law, says that, sure enough, President Bush is doing “grave harm to the separation of powers doctrine”.
Perhaps more worrisome is that those very same people who may lose power to the President are backing him in this.
The ABA report said President Reagan was the first to use the statements as a strategic weapon, and that it was encouraged by then-administration lawyer Samuel Alito — now the newest Supreme Court justice.
That suggests that the Supreme Court might not fight back very hard if something relating to this pracitce came across their respective desks. It also means that the signing statements might carry more weight if the Supreme Court thinks they’re okay. Now, that may be reading too much into what could be a coincidence. But when it comes to the Bush administration serving its own interests under the guise of fighting terror and at the expense of our freedoms, I’m not inclinded to give much benefit of the doubt.