Reply #82: Moyers website....... Bruce Fein on Signing Statements...... [View All]

[RedEarth]

July 13, 2007

Bruce Fein, part of this week's panel on impeachment, recently testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee about the constitutional implications of presidential signing statements.

Often under the radar, these statements are beginning to gain attention, as scholars and critics debate their effect on constitutional checks and balances. How much do you know about signing statements?


What is a signing statement?

When signing a bill, the President often issues a written comment about how he interprets the bill and how he plans to execute it. Many statements are straightforward, simply expressing the President's opinions about the specific legislation.

Yet others are more controversial, when they dictate which portions of a bill the President decides he will not execute because he believes they infringe on the executive powers granted in the Constitution.

........

President Bush and the Growth of the Executive

President Bush has issued over 108 signing statements, which mostly remain unreported until early 2006, when the President issued a statement in conjunction with his signing of a torture statute, pushed through by Senator John McCain. After signing the statute, which was crafted in order to make illegal approved torture by the executive branch, President Bush wrote the following statement:

"The executive branch shall construe Title X in Division A of the Act, relating to detainees, in a manner consistent with the Constitutional authority of the President to supervise the unitary executive branch and as Commander-in-Chief and consistent with the Constitutional limitations on the judicial power which will assist in achieving the shared objective of the Congress and the President, evidenced in Title X, of protecting the American people from further terrorist attacks."

President Bush has most often asserted his deemed constitutional duty "to supervise the unitary executive," as reason why his Administration has chosen not to execute a specific aspect of a law.

As Bruce Fein explained before the Senate Judiciary Committee:

"If all other avenues have proved unavailing, Congress should contemplate impeachment for signing statements that systematically flout the separation of powers and legislative prerogatives. The epitome of an impeachable offense, as Alexander Hamilton amplified in the Federalist Papers, is a political crime against the Constitution."

Click here to read many of President Bush's recent signing statements.

http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/07132007/signing_statements.html