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See: impeachment proceedings. Concretely, the Trump administration ignored Congressional subpoenas, among other things, in clear acts of obstruction of justice

See: impeachment proceedings. Concretely, the Trump administration ignored Congressional subpoenas, among other things, in clear acts of obstruction of justice in a way that undermined Congressional authority. Also see, for instance, his treatment of tax returns. Partisan polarization has made the idea of interbranch checks and balances defunct.

philwelch 7y ago
The courts never made a ruling on whether those Congressional subpoenas were legally binding—in fact, when one of the people subpoenaed tried to take that question to federal court, the House instead chose to withdraw the subpoena. I’m also not sure what Trump’s tax returns have to do with checks and balances between the Congress and the President. Setting those things aside, claiming that Congress doesn’t act as a check on the President simply does not square up with such things as the government shutdowns of 2013, 2018, and 2018/19, the Senate’s refusal to confirm Obama’s appointment of Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court, the 2011 debt ceiling crisis, and it only goes on from there. Partisan polarization has made the checks and balances between the two elected branches more, not less relevant.
- anthm1988 7y ago
  If those subpoenas aren't valid, then congress cannot possible act as a check on the president. > Senate’s refusal to confirm Obama’s appointment of Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court Not a check so much as a complete refusal to perform constitutional duty. What McConnell did was subvert the process of checks and balances to remove the presidents ability to make appointments.
  - philwelch 7y ago
    > If those subpoenas aren't valid, then congress cannot possible act as a check on the president Sure they can. They can refuse to confirm his appointments, they can pass laws with a large enough supermajority to override his veto, and they can even remove him from office with a Senate supermajority. > What McConnell did was subvert the process of checks and balances to remove the presidents ability to make appointments. Thus disproving this notion that Congress is powerless against the President. The President has the constitutional power to make appointments with the advice and consent of the Senate. There's nothing in the Constitution that says the Senate has to have a good reason to withhold that consent.
    - anthm1988 7y ago
      > There's nothing in the Constitution that says the Senate has to have a good reason to withhold that consent. The constitution is a deeply flawed document that relies on the acceptance of norms and generally good actors. Absent that you end up with a wannabe dictator like Trump acting basically unchallenged. > and they can even remove him from office with a Senate supermajority. an act made much harder when the executive flouts subpoenas.
- scarmig 7y ago
  No; you're attempting to evade the central point by changing the argument to a typical Republican/Democratic slugfest. I don't care about the merits of Congressional prerogatives here, which is an entirely secondary point. The point is that the Founding Fathers believed that Congress would defend its own prerogatives against the executive. This has been proven false: a model where government is dominated by partisan prerogatives is far more descriptive of reality than one where branches-of-governments pursue their own prerogatives. Your latter point--that a Republican Congress investigated and obstructed a Democratic President--is true, but it is, again, an indication that Congress is driven by the needs of the political parties who happen to be running it at the time, not as an institution in itself. This is entirely contrary to what the vaunted Founding Fathers intended or expected. Not least because the main thinkers among them thought the system would prevent the development of political parties. The Constitution was theorized to deal with abstractions that don't correspond to reality, and it doesn't even consider the most important driver of politics and governance not only in the contemporary world but in the world that existed a year after it was ratified. In a world where political parties are accepted as a given and inevitable, no one would write anything like the Constitution and expect it to be effective. And no one has: even after WW2, when the US was drafting constitutions for its defeated opponents, it went with documents entirely unlike our own.
  - philwelch 7y ago
    > you're attempting to evade the central point by changing the argument to a typical Republican/Democratic slugfest. I wasn't intending to. > I don't care about the merits of Congressional prerogatives here, which is an entirely secondary point. The point is that the Founding Fathers believed that Congress would defend its own prerogatives against the executive. This has been proven false.... Congress is driven by the needs of the political parties who happen to be running it at the time, not as an institution in itself. Got it, this is a better explanation and I think I agree with it.

philwelch 7y ago

The courts never made a ruling on whether those Congressional subpoenas were legally binding—in fact, when one of the people subpoenaed tried to take that question to federal court, the House instead chose to withdraw the subpoena. I’m also not sure what Trump’s tax returns have to do with checks and balances between the Congress and the President. Setting those things aside, claiming that Congress doesn’t act as a check on the President simply does not square up with such things as the government shutdowns of 2013, 2018, and 2018/19, the Senate’s refusal to confirm Obama’s appointment of Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court, the 2011 debt ceiling crisis, and it only goes on from there. Partisan polarization has made the checks and balances between the two elected branches more, not less relevant.

anthm1988 7y ago
If those subpoenas aren't valid, then congress cannot possible act as a check on the president. > Senate’s refusal to confirm Obama’s appointment of Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court Not a check so much as a complete refusal to perform constitutional duty. What McConnell did was subvert the process of checks and balances to remove the presidents ability to make appointments.
- philwelch 7y ago
  > If those subpoenas aren't valid, then congress cannot possible act as a check on the president Sure they can. They can refuse to confirm his appointments, they can pass laws with a large enough supermajority to override his veto, and they can even remove him from office with a Senate supermajority. > What McConnell did was subvert the process of checks and balances to remove the presidents ability to make appointments. Thus disproving this notion that Congress is powerless against the President. The President has the constitutional power to make appointments with the advice and consent of the Senate. There's nothing in the Constitution that says the Senate has to have a good reason to withhold that consent.
  - anthm1988 7y ago
    > There's nothing in the Constitution that says the Senate has to have a good reason to withhold that consent. The constitution is a deeply flawed document that relies on the acceptance of norms and generally good actors. Absent that you end up with a wannabe dictator like Trump acting basically unchallenged. > and they can even remove him from office with a Senate supermajority. an act made much harder when the executive flouts subpoenas.
scarmig 7y ago
No; you're attempting to evade the central point by changing the argument to a typical Republican/Democratic slugfest. I don't care about the merits of Congressional prerogatives here, which is an entirely secondary point. The point is that the Founding Fathers believed that Congress would defend its own prerogatives against the executive. This has been proven false: a model where government is dominated by partisan prerogatives is far more descriptive of reality than one where branches-of-governments pursue their own prerogatives. Your latter point--that a Republican Congress investigated and obstructed a Democratic President--is true, but it is, again, an indication that Congress is driven by the needs of the political parties who happen to be running it at the time, not as an institution in itself. This is entirely contrary to what the vaunted Founding Fathers intended or expected. Not least because the main thinkers among them thought the system would prevent the development of political parties. The Constitution was theorized to deal with abstractions that don't correspond to reality, and it doesn't even consider the most important driver of politics and governance not only in the contemporary world but in the world that existed a year after it was ratified. In a world where political parties are accepted as a given and inevitable, no one would write anything like the Constitution and expect it to be effective. And no one has: even after WW2, when the US was drafting constitutions for its defeated opponents, it went with documents entirely unlike our own.
- philwelch 7y ago
  > you're attempting to evade the central point by changing the argument to a typical Republican/Democratic slugfest. I wasn't intending to. > I don't care about the merits of Congressional prerogatives here, which is an entirely secondary point. The point is that the Founding Fathers believed that Congress would defend its own prerogatives against the executive. This has been proven false.... Congress is driven by the needs of the political parties who happen to be running it at the time, not as an institution in itself. Got it, this is a better explanation and I think I agree with it.