Ignoring Congress

Nation Of Laws: Ignoring Congress

SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER EDITORIAL BOARD

The Bush administration's disregard for the Constitution is showing.

An American Bar Association panel issued a report Monday on the administration's practice of negating new laws with signing statements that create so many exceptions the president turns congressional intent upside down. The panel, which includes prominent conservatives, said the administration has taken the practice so far that some actions are "contrary to the rule of law and our constitutional system of separation of powers."

As the White House argues, the practice isn't new. But the administration has turned the use of signing statements into a part of its broad attempt to restore presidential powers to pre-Watergate levels or beyond. By the panel's count, the Bush signing statements challenge about 800 provisions of law, more than in all U.S. history.

It's no coincidence Bush has only one veto. Panel member Bruce Fein, who served in the Reagan administration, told The Washington Post a signing statement "is an absolute veto, because the Congress has no power to override him." As another panel member, former FBI Director William Sessions, wrote in a P-I Op-Ed July 12, "Our country's framers intended that no single person would have complete and unilateral control over government." Disobeying that principle threatens liberty.

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Ignoring Congress sounds like my love life. -Ib