Structurally, this kind of end run around Congress seems very unlikely to end up in a better place than the current system. Greatly increased Presidential power + competitive elections + polarization is an unstable state, potential wild swings in policy and public administration every 4 years is not tenable for long. It will collapse into some new equilibrium. Could turn out that the overheated "democracy is on the ballot" rhetoric was not so hyperbolic after all.
Supporting such a destabilizing change to a highly successful system, because it helps advance one's views on mundane issues of spending priorities, is ... myopic may be the kindest way to put it. I hope - and expect - that there is still enough wisdom in the judiciary to reject that path and insist that Congress continue its historical role as a stabilizing deliberative body. Over the objections of the current Congressmen themselves, if necessary.
If impoundment is accepted, I think it IS a better place for fans of limited government and/or federalism.
If every time a Republican President follows a Democrat trifecta, he can kill all the Federal agencies and the departments that the Democrats built in the meantime, then the rational equilibrium is for the Democrats to try to reach a consensus with the Republicans on any further expansions of the Federal government, and otherwise to focus on building programs within the states they control.
Seems win-win to me. In a starkly polarized country, the states SHOULD be more powerful and differentiated on policy.
That is not an equilibrium - one side has all the leverage. There is nearly zero chance that the impoundment power could both 1) persist and 2) be used only as you describe. It would either be eliminated, escalated (e.g. by selectively impounding funding to political opponents' districts), or the whole structure would prove unworkable and collapse.
I agree that it will likely be eliminated in time -- it has, after all, been eliminated once before. But maybe some important reforms can be achieved in the meantime.
I don't really buy that we're talking about collapse. The Federal government isn't going to collapse under Trump, why should it collapse under his successors? The system will stabilize once the lines have been drawn and clarified. If not, the Constitution isn't a suicide pact, I'm confident we'll find a way out.
But sure, I do imagine you'll see some things like targeting districts, since pork is already an entrenched part of our system. Then again, so is DEI. I still think it's a worthwhile trade if we can cripple DEI -- one form of targeting political opponents -- in exchange for some of our districts being disfavored half the time. This is partly based on the expectation that the DEI complex will take time and effort for the Democrats to rebuild, it won't just happen overnight.
And not all examples of targeting districts need even be bad: politically it will be much easier to do this if the sorts of spending targeted are especially gross examples of pork. We briefly gave the President line-item veto power specifically to fight pork, which was probably a good idea. There was a balanced budget in those days.
But if we're talking about cutting off Medicare in districts that voted the wrong way, I don't believe there's any way that will fly.
I agree with you that collapse seems unlikely at the moment, but conservatives used to be the ones who understood that change should be incremental and slow so that you don't throw the baby out with the bathwater.
You can only reach a new equilibrium if one side surrenders or if both sides de-escalate. If Democrats react by escalating with legally dubious power grabs of their own, collapse is the likely end result. It's like slapping someone else in the face while remaining confident you won't end up in a fist fight.
Unless of course the Democrat comes in and launches their own revolution, refusing to work with MAGA (republican is now a minor party) and simply implements all of their own wants and needs in the same way Trump is. Granted adding to the budget is harder (as explained above) than simply refusing to spend budget but as we see with Trump I’m there is always a way around. The court won’t last forever and there is little doubt Dems will turn their full attention to getting back in office and most likely working to out limits on Judges. I don’t see a future where working together is the default, likely this rift continues.
If the argument is that in response to Trump seizing a government-limiting power that is at least legally and historically defensible, the Democrats will seize new government-expanding powers that are much less defensible, I dunno man. Maybe they could do that anyway, Trump or no Trump, in response to e.g. the crisis of transphobia afflicting this country.
In that scenario I think I’d rather at least start from a base where the Federal bureaucracy has been shrunk, depoliticized and disempowered, so the Dems at least have more work to do to destroy us.
Personally I’m not conservative just a centrist. I don’t see most of what Trump is doing as anything but ideological and a good portion of it isn’t defensible from a legal or historic stance. My bet is that he will break the government but be unable to strengthen and solidify it. I don’t think this Trump team has the qualifications, knowledge or rationality to actually put something solid together out of this mess. I think it’s likely he irritates the population from a financial standpoint, Dems win the next election and have a broken gov they can do anything with and instill whatever they want while proclaiming they are fixing Trumps mess. Maybe I’ll be wrong, maybe this will work out but I doubt it.
So increasing executive authority is how you get limited government? Sounds suspiciously like war is peace or freedom is slavery.
But I agree with you that Democrats may just decide to promote federalism and build their own systems in their home states. Red state GDP will go down as a result though, so Republicans may find themselves trying to salvage the systems they say they don't want.
If it's the authority to cut spending - yes. Would also argue that line-item veto helps with limited government but it's technically an increase of executive authority.
It's just checks and balances, 8th grade civics. The issue is that the bureaucracy is the unofficial 4th branch of government and it OUGHT to be the weakest, being unelected and the most opaque. But both the President and Congress were proving unable to control it, so new tools were needed.
People who demand more power don't stop after you give it to them. They keep taking it until someone stops them.
Have we forgotten that Trump already had a full term and never cared one bit about cutting spending for anything the whole time? That he added more to the deficit than any president before? "Make the checks bigger" he said. Ryan tried to get him to cut spending and he told Ryan to eat a grape. Trump isn't motivated by fiscal responsibility.
Congress and the President are elected by us. If they can't control spending then that's a problem with the priorities of the voters. I don't like it any more than you do, but empowering the executive by undermining the checks and balances of the other two branches won't balance the budget. It just hastens the day when we lose the republic.
The rhetoric by left wing media was over the top in relation to social stances they wanted to take but after Jan 6th there was no going back. Trumps win sealed the deal, Americans are not concerned with the constitution. Biden’s attempt to tweet a constitutional change showed that Dems will follow directly in the path of Trump and opened the doors to a new reality in America. The conditional republic is dead, with it the system of checks and balances. Political fervor will decide what happens every 4 years until inevitably one executive convinces everyone they should maintain power for a longer period than 4/8 years. This is how every great power beings to lose its grip on reality. Ben Franklin said it best “if you can keep it” the citizens of this country have no interest in doing so.
I largely agree with these views about the risks of upsetting the current order. Yet the same could said of the presidency of FDR, LBJ, and even Teddy Roosevelt. Their administrations, with various degrees of Congressional and Courts support, did radically change the structure and purview of the federal government. Many of those changes are now seen as positive, but at the time they were considered extreme and destabilizing.
FDR in particular was castigating from the right as embracing Socialism while those on American left branded him a fascist. And many of his administration programs were likely counterproductive, even in the short term. For example, the National Recovery Administration established government mediated cartels to ensure high prices and salaries and thereby fight deflation. Yet the process of structuring specific industries while leaving others to the markets was open at least the appearance of corruption. Moreover, these cartels were highly distortionary and likely harmed economic recoveries. The FDR administration even began to recognize this at the time and quietly wound these down cartels after the NRA was struck down by the courts.
I'm not saying Trump will be celebrated for his bold, novel actions by future generations. Quite the opposite, I imagine he and his administration lack the convictions to work towards outcomes appreciated by the mass majority of voters. Yet that is very much an in-the-moment judgement and history may think differently. Eg, Trump's earlier administration was certainly important in centering our current bipartisan, hawkish stance towards China.
Regardless, our current stance of allowing these issues to grow and compound was unsustainable and at least Trump's team is attempting something. It may come down to future Democratic, or even less-MAGA Republican, administration to develop a reasonable and sustainable approach. So we'll see how this evolves over the coming years.
More like 3.1-term (he died three months into the 4th one), and it was long before the lived experience of any living voter. Also that was before there was a provision in the Constitution flatly prohibiting it....so not sure that one-off instance will have any relevance going forward from here.
There isn't a strong pressure to consider FDR aberrant when presidential scholars and elementary school teachers alike laude him as one of the best presidents ever.
That's quite the equivocation. FDR being elected to 4 terms was not unconstitutional at the time, it had never happened before, but it was allowed. Now, it is flatly unconstitutional for that to happen. Even the amendment that congressman is proposing isn't about abolishing term limits, but allowing presidents to have 3 terms. Now, if they somehow (impossible), manage to pass that amendment or something similar, that's a different question.
I think it's relevant that in the movie Civil War, it seems the trigger was that the president was elected to a third term with the current restriction still in place. I can definitely see several states going for secession if Trump is elected to a third term.
And anyway, the republican fascination with Trump is rather nonsensical at this point, who's to say the guy will be alive in 2028? I have trouble visualizing the post-Trump Republicans.
Interesting thoughts. It may well be that we're moving away from the post-1960s system of unlimited judicial power and a strong, left-wing civil service, and towards a more Latin-American-style system of freewheeling executive power (accompanied by widespread corruption and rapid swings in policy ever time there's a new president).
Granted, the old system needed to go - it was in my opinion largely responsible for America's economic decline over the last 50 years (due to too much regulation and litigation making it unprofitable to build physical stuff and especially infrastructure) and also the extreme political polarization amd hatreds that you naturally get when one side so often feels cheated (as conservatives felt when radical policies on abortion, bussing, etc. were forced on them without their opponents winning any elections.)
Still, I am far from convinced that the Latin-American-style system with a powerful, unpredictable, and corrupt executive offers a stable way out. What we really need is just a much stronger national legislature with the mability to rein in abuses of power by both the executive and the judiciary. This is clearly what the Founders thoughts they were creating as evidenced by the Federalist Papers... and yet I don't think our country is really capable of genuine self-government (by which I mean the elected legislature being the most powerful organ of government) in this day and age.
Is there any country out there with a really strong legislature that drives the direction of the country? The wesminister style seems superficially to be that, but in practice it works the same way with the executive just being the leadership of dominant party or coalition. Once the government is formed, the alignment with the majority in the legislature has even fewer structural checks and balances than the US.
I believe that 19th century Britain and the United States from Lincoln's time to Roosevelt's both had strong national legislatures of a sort that we rarely see anymore. And in a Westminster style system the "check" on the majority is that any governing coalition includes moderates, who will desert the ruling party if it tries to make itself too powerful. It isn't perfect, but it's much better than a system that pretends to offer limited government by putting the elected arm of the government (congress + president + state & local officials) under the domination of a dictatorial federal judiciary that does not, itself, experience any checks or balances whatsoever.
The Founders never planned/anticipated the federal government usurping states/individuals rights, which they've done since the Civil War, accelerating to the present time. Only a strong executive branch can curtail the legislative branch, which creates regulations and laws by the tends of thousands, the vast proportion via special interests and not in the interest of The People.
This comment is not in defense or against Trump. Correct me if I’m wrong but myers v US (1926) is the precedent he is using to limit executive agency power with executive orders (firing people, cutting budget) and Humphreys executor vs US (1935) is why he can’t go after independent agencies. USAID for example is not statutorily independent because it’s under control of the executive branch. Seems to me like allowing the president to reduce power instead of increase it makes sense but I’m not sure if it’s a Trojan horse - my mental model isn’t really complete yet.
Yep you’re 100% right. Even if the NLRB is as duplicative and useless as it seems to be. Although if that person took that pay package I don’t think that qualifies as firing.
Ten million tweets about autocracy being horrible and the rule of dumb chuds being the worst thing ever.
In reality: one strong man and some dumb chuds actually doing the good shit people expected from genteel conservatives and that libertarian wonks have been talking about for decades.
It was a smart people that made this happen at all when it was just the dumb chuds and the strongman the last time, they did nothing even though they easily could've done it then. Anyone else could've implemented this. They'll tar and shame us carrying our banner, and we might well see this all undone if they crater the country enough, which is still highly likely.
The only guaranteed positive is that we're already so unpopular and marginslized that they're tarring us with whatever horrible things they do won't make us more unpopular but will spread wider awareness which can only help the movement and even win us far more converts than we'd get otherwise.
Great work Richard, this was the only reason I voted for the Dems in this past election. The only thing that mattered at any point was cutting off the nosedive into autocracy. While Trump won’t be able to complete that nosedive alone, I have no doubt that the next democratic president elected will step in and use this same game plan to install their own government in just as extreme a fashion. The republic is dead, long live the king!
Um, unlimited power by the judiciary and (beneath them) the civil service IS autocracy.
Presidents can be voted out after four years - and even within that timespan they're still limited by a lot of congressional and judicial restraints. Judges don't have any of those limits. If you were one of the victims of forced bussing, or someone who lost his job because of a NEPA lawsuit, them the fact that the lifetime-appointed officials doing that to you (whose actions - at least in the matter of bussing - can't be restrained by elected officials no matter how many elections your side wins) don't wear crowns or put giant posters of themselves all over the place like Kim Jong Un... does not make the system any less autocratic.
Did not think of it in this way but you hit on some key points here. I personally believe we should limit judges, our founders did not see judges living into their late 80s early 90s when they wrote the constitution. Further if we agree to provide a solid salary and benefits for all judges when their time is up and have them agree not to enter the private sector upon the end of their term we can limit the damage done by private influence.
Interestingly enough, constant court-packing by both sides might eventually compel both sides to agree to a new constitutional amendment that does term limits for SCOTUS Justices.
Still, lifetime tenure for SCOTUS Justices is a mixed blessing. On the one hand, they can really screw up with things like forced busing (though even then, can't Congress invoke jurisdiction stripping to strip SCOTUS of jursdiction over this issue?), but they can also theoretically do something very positive in the future in regards to say, re-legalizing child sex dolls/robots nationwide. On that specific issue, I'd very strongly prefer to let unelected judges settle this question than to let bigoted majoritarian mobs settle this question.
Interestingly enough, constant court-packing by both sides might eventually compel both sides to agree to a new constitutional amendment that does term limits for SCOTUS Justices.
Still, lifetime tenure for SCOTUS Justices is a mixed blessing. On the one hand, they can really screw up with things like forced busing (though even then, can't Congress invoke jurisdiction stripping to strip SCOTUS of jursdiction over this issue?), but they can also theoretically do something very positive in the future in regards to say, re-legalizing child sex dolls/robots nationwide. On that specific issue, I'd very strongly prefer to let unelected judges settle this question than to let bigoted majoritarian mobs settle this question.
No thanks lol! On issues which involves strongly detested minorities and harmless conduct, I'd *strongly* prefer to let unelected judges settle these questions than to let majoritarian mobs settle these questions!
I do think that bans on child sex dolls/robots are a form of caste legislation which, in an ideal world, should be invalidated by SCOTUS on this ground, similar to sodomy bans in the past. Depriving people of a satisfactory harm-free sex life is indeed arguably a form of caste legislation.
Extremely substantial post and I need to ruminate on it a bit. But with respect to the Trump/Johnson comparison: couldn't you argue Reagan played a similar role as a de facto "re-interpreter" of American government? His previously-marginal theories weren't (primarily) built around consolidating executive power but they were still "revolutionary" in the sense of re-conceptualizing the established role and function of the government as a whole.
I'm not well versed on all the history here, but I think Reagan had an enormous impact from a cultural standpoint, just not a legal one. He influenced the GOP to reject Nixonian ideas about the role of government, but I can't think of a single thing about the powers of the office itself that changed, nor anything about the balance of powers shifting as a result of his presidency.
> why is conservatism associated with wanting to put a great deal of power in the hands of the executive, while liberals tend to call for a stronger Congress?
This is a faulty premise, IMO. The consistent trend in the modern era has been that presidents of BOTH parties stretch the power of the Executive branch, and Congresses of BOTH parties have abdicated power. Obama and Biden both pushed boundaries with their EOs as well - remember "I have a phone and a pen"?
Trump's actions are a further escalation, of course - but an escalation of what has unfortunately been a bipartisan trend as Congress has grown less and less functional.
Yes, Congress came to view their function as spending as much as they possibly could with no regard for taxpayers at all. Free money everywhere. As Davey Crocket said, “It’s not yours to spend.”
"Trump has become a revolutionary figure and is now sure to go down as our most consequential president since at least Lyndon Johnson."
Still can't believe this happened. Obama will now only be remembered as the guy who led to the Trump era.
Serves him right. Imagine how much trouble we would've avoided if he didn't sincerely believe in race and sex communism. Like he actually was the moderate, unifying figure he pretended to be.
Trump's executive orders on transgenderism, immigration, DEI, federal buyouts, etc are all being subjected to federal injunctions and blocked from implementation. It's a spectacle for his low information supporters, not a real political paradigm shift.
I suspect the conservatives preferring the executive over legislative branch thing comes down to your observation that "liberals read, conservatives watch TV". Liberals are wordcels - creating legislation dovetails nicely with their general ethos. Conservatives like action - they want to see things being done.
Your best post of the last and this year. It highlights why these two weeks have made President Trump undoubtedly the most consequential president since LBJ. With over 300 executive orders, I hope a majority of these become the new law of the land. You had not expected it, based on the pre-election writing. Gracious of you to write as you have. Thank you.
Structurally, this kind of end run around Congress seems very unlikely to end up in a better place than the current system. Greatly increased Presidential power + competitive elections + polarization is an unstable state, potential wild swings in policy and public administration every 4 years is not tenable for long. It will collapse into some new equilibrium. Could turn out that the overheated "democracy is on the ballot" rhetoric was not so hyperbolic after all.
Supporting such a destabilizing change to a highly successful system, because it helps advance one's views on mundane issues of spending priorities, is ... myopic may be the kindest way to put it. I hope - and expect - that there is still enough wisdom in the judiciary to reject that path and insist that Congress continue its historical role as a stabilizing deliberative body. Over the objections of the current Congressmen themselves, if necessary.
If impoundment is accepted, I think it IS a better place for fans of limited government and/or federalism.
If every time a Republican President follows a Democrat trifecta, he can kill all the Federal agencies and the departments that the Democrats built in the meantime, then the rational equilibrium is for the Democrats to try to reach a consensus with the Republicans on any further expansions of the Federal government, and otherwise to focus on building programs within the states they control.
Seems win-win to me. In a starkly polarized country, the states SHOULD be more powerful and differentiated on policy.
That is not an equilibrium - one side has all the leverage. There is nearly zero chance that the impoundment power could both 1) persist and 2) be used only as you describe. It would either be eliminated, escalated (e.g. by selectively impounding funding to political opponents' districts), or the whole structure would prove unworkable and collapse.
I agree that it will likely be eliminated in time -- it has, after all, been eliminated once before. But maybe some important reforms can be achieved in the meantime.
I don't really buy that we're talking about collapse. The Federal government isn't going to collapse under Trump, why should it collapse under his successors? The system will stabilize once the lines have been drawn and clarified. If not, the Constitution isn't a suicide pact, I'm confident we'll find a way out.
But sure, I do imagine you'll see some things like targeting districts, since pork is already an entrenched part of our system. Then again, so is DEI. I still think it's a worthwhile trade if we can cripple DEI -- one form of targeting political opponents -- in exchange for some of our districts being disfavored half the time. This is partly based on the expectation that the DEI complex will take time and effort for the Democrats to rebuild, it won't just happen overnight.
And not all examples of targeting districts need even be bad: politically it will be much easier to do this if the sorts of spending targeted are especially gross examples of pork. We briefly gave the President line-item veto power specifically to fight pork, which was probably a good idea. There was a balanced budget in those days.
But if we're talking about cutting off Medicare in districts that voted the wrong way, I don't believe there's any way that will fly.
I agree with you that collapse seems unlikely at the moment, but conservatives used to be the ones who understood that change should be incremental and slow so that you don't throw the baby out with the bathwater.
You can only reach a new equilibrium if one side surrenders or if both sides de-escalate. If Democrats react by escalating with legally dubious power grabs of their own, collapse is the likely end result. It's like slapping someone else in the face while remaining confident you won't end up in a fist fight.
Unless of course the Democrat comes in and launches their own revolution, refusing to work with MAGA (republican is now a minor party) and simply implements all of their own wants and needs in the same way Trump is. Granted adding to the budget is harder (as explained above) than simply refusing to spend budget but as we see with Trump I’m there is always a way around. The court won’t last forever and there is little doubt Dems will turn their full attention to getting back in office and most likely working to out limits on Judges. I don’t see a future where working together is the default, likely this rift continues.
If the argument is that in response to Trump seizing a government-limiting power that is at least legally and historically defensible, the Democrats will seize new government-expanding powers that are much less defensible, I dunno man. Maybe they could do that anyway, Trump or no Trump, in response to e.g. the crisis of transphobia afflicting this country.
In that scenario I think I’d rather at least start from a base where the Federal bureaucracy has been shrunk, depoliticized and disempowered, so the Dems at least have more work to do to destroy us.
Personally I’m not conservative just a centrist. I don’t see most of what Trump is doing as anything but ideological and a good portion of it isn’t defensible from a legal or historic stance. My bet is that he will break the government but be unable to strengthen and solidify it. I don’t think this Trump team has the qualifications, knowledge or rationality to actually put something solid together out of this mess. I think it’s likely he irritates the population from a financial standpoint, Dems win the next election and have a broken gov they can do anything with and instill whatever they want while proclaiming they are fixing Trumps mess. Maybe I’ll be wrong, maybe this will work out but I doubt it.
So increasing executive authority is how you get limited government? Sounds suspiciously like war is peace or freedom is slavery.
But I agree with you that Democrats may just decide to promote federalism and build their own systems in their home states. Red state GDP will go down as a result though, so Republicans may find themselves trying to salvage the systems they say they don't want.
If it's the authority to cut spending - yes. Would also argue that line-item veto helps with limited government but it's technically an increase of executive authority.
It's just checks and balances, 8th grade civics. The issue is that the bureaucracy is the unofficial 4th branch of government and it OUGHT to be the weakest, being unelected and the most opaque. But both the President and Congress were proving unable to control it, so new tools were needed.
People who demand more power don't stop after you give it to them. They keep taking it until someone stops them.
Have we forgotten that Trump already had a full term and never cared one bit about cutting spending for anything the whole time? That he added more to the deficit than any president before? "Make the checks bigger" he said. Ryan tried to get him to cut spending and he told Ryan to eat a grape. Trump isn't motivated by fiscal responsibility.
Congress and the President are elected by us. If they can't control spending then that's a problem with the priorities of the voters. I don't like it any more than you do, but empowering the executive by undermining the checks and balances of the other two branches won't balance the budget. It just hastens the day when we lose the republic.
The rhetoric by left wing media was over the top in relation to social stances they wanted to take but after Jan 6th there was no going back. Trumps win sealed the deal, Americans are not concerned with the constitution. Biden’s attempt to tweet a constitutional change showed that Dems will follow directly in the path of Trump and opened the doors to a new reality in America. The conditional republic is dead, with it the system of checks and balances. Political fervor will decide what happens every 4 years until inevitably one executive convinces everyone they should maintain power for a longer period than 4/8 years. This is how every great power beings to lose its grip on reality. Ben Franklin said it best “if you can keep it” the citizens of this country have no interest in doing so.
I largely agree with these views about the risks of upsetting the current order. Yet the same could said of the presidency of FDR, LBJ, and even Teddy Roosevelt. Their administrations, with various degrees of Congressional and Courts support, did radically change the structure and purview of the federal government. Many of those changes are now seen as positive, but at the time they were considered extreme and destabilizing.
FDR in particular was castigating from the right as embracing Socialism while those on American left branded him a fascist. And many of his administration programs were likely counterproductive, even in the short term. For example, the National Recovery Administration established government mediated cartels to ensure high prices and salaries and thereby fight deflation. Yet the process of structuring specific industries while leaving others to the markets was open at least the appearance of corruption. Moreover, these cartels were highly distortionary and likely harmed economic recoveries. The FDR administration even began to recognize this at the time and quietly wound these down cartels after the NRA was struck down by the courts.
I'm not saying Trump will be celebrated for his bold, novel actions by future generations. Quite the opposite, I imagine he and his administration lack the convictions to work towards outcomes appreciated by the mass majority of voters. Yet that is very much an in-the-moment judgement and history may think differently. Eg, Trump's earlier administration was certainly important in centering our current bipartisan, hawkish stance towards China.
Regardless, our current stance of allowing these issues to grow and compound was unsustainable and at least Trump's team is attempting something. It may come down to future Democratic, or even less-MAGA Republican, administration to develop a reasonable and sustainable approach. So we'll see how this evolves over the coming years.
Apparently forgetting that we already had a four term president.
More like 3.1-term (he died three months into the 4th one), and it was long before the lived experience of any living voter. Also that was before there was a provision in the Constitution flatly prohibiting it....so not sure that one-off instance will have any relevance going forward from here.
There isn't a strong pressure to consider FDR aberrant when presidential scholars and elementary school teachers alike laude him as one of the best presidents ever.
Not sure what that statement means in the context of this discussion.
Voters will hardly say no to another 4 term president if they like him and the precedent is set.
That's quite the equivocation. FDR being elected to 4 terms was not unconstitutional at the time, it had never happened before, but it was allowed. Now, it is flatly unconstitutional for that to happen. Even the amendment that congressman is proposing isn't about abolishing term limits, but allowing presidents to have 3 terms. Now, if they somehow (impossible), manage to pass that amendment or something similar, that's a different question.
I think it's relevant that in the movie Civil War, it seems the trigger was that the president was elected to a third term with the current restriction still in place. I can definitely see several states going for secession if Trump is elected to a third term.
And anyway, the republican fascination with Trump is rather nonsensical at this point, who's to say the guy will be alive in 2028? I have trouble visualizing the post-Trump Republicans.
Interesting thoughts. It may well be that we're moving away from the post-1960s system of unlimited judicial power and a strong, left-wing civil service, and towards a more Latin-American-style system of freewheeling executive power (accompanied by widespread corruption and rapid swings in policy ever time there's a new president).
Granted, the old system needed to go - it was in my opinion largely responsible for America's economic decline over the last 50 years (due to too much regulation and litigation making it unprofitable to build physical stuff and especially infrastructure) and also the extreme political polarization amd hatreds that you naturally get when one side so often feels cheated (as conservatives felt when radical policies on abortion, bussing, etc. were forced on them without their opponents winning any elections.)
Still, I am far from convinced that the Latin-American-style system with a powerful, unpredictable, and corrupt executive offers a stable way out. What we really need is just a much stronger national legislature with the mability to rein in abuses of power by both the executive and the judiciary. This is clearly what the Founders thoughts they were creating as evidenced by the Federalist Papers... and yet I don't think our country is really capable of genuine self-government (by which I mean the elected legislature being the most powerful organ of government) in this day and age.
Is there any country out there with a really strong legislature that drives the direction of the country? The wesminister style seems superficially to be that, but in practice it works the same way with the executive just being the leadership of dominant party or coalition. Once the government is formed, the alignment with the majority in the legislature has even fewer structural checks and balances than the US.
I believe that 19th century Britain and the United States from Lincoln's time to Roosevelt's both had strong national legislatures of a sort that we rarely see anymore. And in a Westminster style system the "check" on the majority is that any governing coalition includes moderates, who will desert the ruling party if it tries to make itself too powerful. It isn't perfect, but it's much better than a system that pretends to offer limited government by putting the elected arm of the government (congress + president + state & local officials) under the domination of a dictatorial federal judiciary that does not, itself, experience any checks or balances whatsoever.
The Founders never planned/anticipated the federal government usurping states/individuals rights, which they've done since the Civil War, accelerating to the present time. Only a strong executive branch can curtail the legislative branch, which creates regulations and laws by the tends of thousands, the vast proportion via special interests and not in the interest of The People.
To make Congress more powerful you need real structural reform. Make the executive answer to Congress more. Get rid of FPTP
This comment is not in defense or against Trump. Correct me if I’m wrong but myers v US (1926) is the precedent he is using to limit executive agency power with executive orders (firing people, cutting budget) and Humphreys executor vs US (1935) is why he can’t go after independent agencies. USAID for example is not statutorily independent because it’s under control of the executive branch. Seems to me like allowing the president to reduce power instead of increase it makes sense but I’m not sure if it’s a Trojan horse - my mental model isn’t really complete yet.
Trump fired an NLRB member, which as far as I know is a direct attack of Humphrey’s Ex.
Yep you’re 100% right. Even if the NLRB is as duplicative and useless as it seems to be. Although if that person took that pay package I don’t think that qualifies as firing.
Very interesting and informative overview of the topic. It is useful to understand the historical background of current events.
Ten million tweets about autocracy being horrible and the rule of dumb chuds being the worst thing ever.
In reality: one strong man and some dumb chuds actually doing the good shit people expected from genteel conservatives and that libertarian wonks have been talking about for decades.
It was a smart people that made this happen at all when it was just the dumb chuds and the strongman the last time, they did nothing even though they easily could've done it then. Anyone else could've implemented this. They'll tar and shame us carrying our banner, and we might well see this all undone if they crater the country enough, which is still highly likely.
The only guaranteed positive is that we're already so unpopular and marginslized that they're tarring us with whatever horrible things they do won't make us more unpopular but will spread wider awareness which can only help the movement and even win us far more converts than we'd get otherwise.
Great work Richard, this was the only reason I voted for the Dems in this past election. The only thing that mattered at any point was cutting off the nosedive into autocracy. While Trump won’t be able to complete that nosedive alone, I have no doubt that the next democratic president elected will step in and use this same game plan to install their own government in just as extreme a fashion. The republic is dead, long live the king!
Um, unlimited power by the judiciary and (beneath them) the civil service IS autocracy.
Presidents can be voted out after four years - and even within that timespan they're still limited by a lot of congressional and judicial restraints. Judges don't have any of those limits. If you were one of the victims of forced bussing, or someone who lost his job because of a NEPA lawsuit, them the fact that the lifetime-appointed officials doing that to you (whose actions - at least in the matter of bussing - can't be restrained by elected officials no matter how many elections your side wins) don't wear crowns or put giant posters of themselves all over the place like Kim Jong Un... does not make the system any less autocratic.
Did not think of it in this way but you hit on some key points here. I personally believe we should limit judges, our founders did not see judges living into their late 80s early 90s when they wrote the constitution. Further if we agree to provide a solid salary and benefits for all judges when their time is up and have them agree not to enter the private sector upon the end of their term we can limit the damage done by private influence.
Interestingly enough, constant court-packing by both sides might eventually compel both sides to agree to a new constitutional amendment that does term limits for SCOTUS Justices.
Still, lifetime tenure for SCOTUS Justices is a mixed blessing. On the one hand, they can really screw up with things like forced busing (though even then, can't Congress invoke jurisdiction stripping to strip SCOTUS of jursdiction over this issue?), but they can also theoretically do something very positive in the future in regards to say, re-legalizing child sex dolls/robots nationwide. On that specific issue, I'd very strongly prefer to let unelected judges settle this question than to let bigoted majoritarian mobs settle this question.
Interestingly enough, constant court-packing by both sides might eventually compel both sides to agree to a new constitutional amendment that does term limits for SCOTUS Justices.
Still, lifetime tenure for SCOTUS Justices is a mixed blessing. On the one hand, they can really screw up with things like forced busing (though even then, can't Congress invoke jurisdiction stripping to strip SCOTUS of jursdiction over this issue?), but they can also theoretically do something very positive in the future in regards to say, re-legalizing child sex dolls/robots nationwide. On that specific issue, I'd very strongly prefer to let unelected judges settle this question than to let bigoted majoritarian mobs settle this question.
No thanks lol! On issues which involves strongly detested minorities and harmless conduct, I'd *strongly* prefer to let unelected judges settle these questions than to let majoritarian mobs settle these questions!
I do think that bans on child sex dolls/robots are a form of caste legislation which, in an ideal world, should be invalidated by SCOTUS on this ground, similar to sodomy bans in the past. Depriving people of a satisfactory harm-free sex life is indeed arguably a form of caste legislation.
There isn’t a way to do it without breaking the law considering that moralfags are hellbelt on criminalizing these things.
As for keeping one away from children, sure, one should be prohibited from adopting children. That seems like a decent, commonsense, safety measure.
Extremely substantial post and I need to ruminate on it a bit. But with respect to the Trump/Johnson comparison: couldn't you argue Reagan played a similar role as a de facto "re-interpreter" of American government? His previously-marginal theories weren't (primarily) built around consolidating executive power but they were still "revolutionary" in the sense of re-conceptualizing the established role and function of the government as a whole.
I'm not well versed on all the history here, but I think Reagan had an enormous impact from a cultural standpoint, just not a legal one. He influenced the GOP to reject Nixonian ideas about the role of government, but I can't think of a single thing about the powers of the office itself that changed, nor anything about the balance of powers shifting as a result of his presidency.
no mentions of FDR in a historical discussion of executive power overreach? seems glib
> why is conservatism associated with wanting to put a great deal of power in the hands of the executive, while liberals tend to call for a stronger Congress?
This is a faulty premise, IMO. The consistent trend in the modern era has been that presidents of BOTH parties stretch the power of the Executive branch, and Congresses of BOTH parties have abdicated power. Obama and Biden both pushed boundaries with their EOs as well - remember "I have a phone and a pen"?
Trump's actions are a further escalation, of course - but an escalation of what has unfortunately been a bipartisan trend as Congress has grown less and less functional.
Yes, Congress came to view their function as spending as much as they possibly could with no regard for taxpayers at all. Free money everywhere. As Davey Crocket said, “It’s not yours to spend.”
"Trump has become a revolutionary figure and is now sure to go down as our most consequential president since at least Lyndon Johnson."
Still can't believe this happened. Obama will now only be remembered as the guy who led to the Trump era.
Serves him right. Imagine how much trouble we would've avoided if he didn't sincerely believe in race and sex communism. Like he actually was the moderate, unifying figure he pretended to be.
Wow! You write, “to as of Friday put.” At this rate the Split Infinitive Hall of Fame will be *dominated* by Richard Hanania entries!
Trump's executive orders on transgenderism, immigration, DEI, federal buyouts, etc are all being subjected to federal injunctions and blocked from implementation. It's a spectacle for his low information supporters, not a real political paradigm shift.
Authorizing spending is very different from forcing spending. It’s wonderful to offer someone a meal. Not so much to force them to eat it.
I suspect the conservatives preferring the executive over legislative branch thing comes down to your observation that "liberals read, conservatives watch TV". Liberals are wordcels - creating legislation dovetails nicely with their general ethos. Conservatives like action - they want to see things being done.
Yeah, the Gaza stuff is pretty stupid but doesn’t this make you sick?
https://substack.com/@janeh28/note/c-91462515?utm_medium=ios
Your best post of the last and this year. It highlights why these two weeks have made President Trump undoubtedly the most consequential president since LBJ. With over 300 executive orders, I hope a majority of these become the new law of the land. You had not expected it, based on the pre-election writing. Gracious of you to write as you have. Thank you.