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At this point I think we can clearly see that the interpretation of our laws is extremely partisan at the moment, to the point that what exact text says is basi

by jmward01 10mo ago

At this point I think we can clearly see that the interpretation of our laws is extremely partisan at the moment, to the point that what exact text says is basically irrelevant. The broader issue here is a massive, completely unchecked, power grab that is -deeply- troubling. Our checks and balances, are failing us and this is another sign of their deterioration.

buellerbueller 10mo ago
Yes, it seems as though a politically-aligned congress is ceding lots of its authority to the executive, while the SCOTUS is restraining the rest of the judiciary from checking the executive. The shame of this is, it is in defiance of the design of the Founders, and will take a LONG time to correct, if we don't descent into authoritarianism before it is corrected.
CGMthrowaway 10mo ago
You may be right, but it may be more accurate to say checks and balances are shifting, not failing wholesale. Judicial review of executive actions is stronger and more frequent than its ever been. Congressional power of the purse is secure. And the REINS Act (not yet passed) would require Congress to approve major agency rules before they take effect
- estearum 10mo ago
  > Congressional power of the purse is secure Which reality do you live in? In my reality, POTUS is doing everything he can to grind down Congress's power of the purse. He's actively pressuring Fed policy, which at its most extreme gives the executive a blank check as it can force the Fed to purchase treasuries, filling the executive's coffers directly. At the same time, they're arguing that pocket rescissions give them the right to avoid spending any individual dollar they do not wish to spend, even if Congress has allocated it. Tell me what gives you confidence that the power of the purse is secure?
  - CGMthrowaway 10mo ago
    >In my reality, POTUS is doing everything he can to grind down Congress's power of the purse. And it hasn't been working well. DOGE failed, SCOTUS has not yet issued a final determination on pocket rescissions, and the Fed can only buy treasuries on the secondary market, meaning the bond market is in control. There is also the debt ceiling which requires Congress to raise it.
    - adgjlsfhk1 10mo ago
      potus has been successful in illegally dismantling whole agencies (e.g. usaid)
    - estearum 10mo ago
      DOGE didn't "fail" to maim the power of the purse. It actually achieved that goal. It failed to produce savings for taxpayers. Totally different. SCOTUS "hasn't issued a final determination" on almost any issue put in front of it in Trump 2. Yet they consistently land on "the administration can do what it wants while we delay actually ruling, even if several lower courts have ruled against this outcome after actually hearing the case at length." The Fed's prohibition from buying Treasuries directly is only relevant if the FOMC is actually independent. If it's not, nothing prevents POTUS from saying "the Fed will buy $x in treasuries at $y," directing them to do so, and creating a clear arb opportunity for all the intermediary banks to buy and re-sell their slice. Sure, that'd trigger a financial crisis, but that's kind of the whole problem with idiot demagogues: they trigger such crises as a matter of course.
rayiner 10mo ago
> I think we can clearly see that the interpretation of our laws is extremely partisan at the moment, to the point that what exact text says is basically irrelevant By “at the moment,” you mean “in the 1930s when the Supreme Court bent over backward to uphold FDD’s administrative state, right?” When they effectively overruled the Supreme Court’s 1926 decision in Myers v. United States, right? Because the text of the constitution says this: “The executive Power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America.” Show me how you get from that to executive agencies exercising executive power independent of the President.
- adgjlsfhk1 10mo ago
  a rule making agency isn't an executive power
  - rayiner 10mo ago
    It does exercise executive power, otherwise it wouldn’t be constitutional. Only congress can make laws. When Congress delegates rulemaking authority to an agency, the agency makes rules pursuant to the executive power to execute the laws. For example, Congress can ban “unfair competition.” But it can leave it to the executive agency charged with enforcing the law to define rules for exactly what constitutes unfair competition. That’s permissible because deciding exactly what’s unfair reasonably falls within the scope of enforcement discretion.
- dataflow 10mo ago
  > Show me how you get from that to executive agencies exercising executive power independent of the President. "[The president] may require the Opinion, in writing, of the principal Officer in each of the executive Departments" Could you please explain why that clause is there if the president can already threaten to fire anyone who doesn't comply with their orders?
  - rayiner 10mo ago
    Hamilton thought it was superfluous. Federalist 74 says: > “The President may require the opinion in writing of the principal officer in each of the executive departments upon any subject relating to the duties of their respective offices.” This I consider as a mere redundancy in the plan; as the right for which it provides would result of itself from the office. Note that this provision must be redundant even without a unitary executive. Because otherwise, the implication is the only thing the President can do with principal officers is to ask them for an opinion. Some modern scholars think the provision, though functionally redundant, is there to address a dispute that arose during the debates about executive councils: https://www.yalejreg.com/nc/reconciling-the-unitary-executive-and-the-opinions-clause-by-michael-b-rappaport/ https://www.yalejreg.com/nc/reconciling-the-unitary-executiv... (“Unsurprisingly, the issue of an executive council arose at the Philadelphia Convention. Several proposals to create a council of state or a privy council were offered. Some of the proposed councils would have provided advice to the President but would not have required that he follow it, whereas others might have required that he secure the consent of the council. But each of the proposals was rejected. Instead, the Convention took language from part of one of the executive council proposals – ‘he may require the written opinions of any one or more members” of the council – as a model for the Opinions Clause.’”). So the clause is there not to describe what the principal officers must do, but what the President need not do. The President may but does not need to consult his principal officers before taking action.
FuriouslyAdrift 10mo ago
Not really. Within the Court, the divide is primarily between originalists and pragmatists. This has been a fight going back a long time in legal theory. It had been dominated by pragmatists since the 1920s and the tide started to turn in the late 1980s. The current Court is dominated by originalists. It has little to do with political parties even though originalist thought is more aligned with conservative social and political thinking and pragmatists are more aligned with progressive thinking.
troyvit 10mo ago
If a Democrat gets the presidency in 2028 do you think they'll restore the FCC's independence? I'd be willing to bet not, because no matter which party is in power, they are going to want to continue to concentrate that power.
- Amezarak 10mo ago
  FDR famously ran the FCC as his personal fiefdom to punish his political enemies. There's nothing new under the sun.
- jmward01 10mo ago
  Exactly why this is a terrible thing. It isn't liberal or conservative to say 'power accumulation in one person is bad'. We need to be actively stripping the executive, and any entrenched position, of power. Democracy needs decentralized power.

buellerbueller 10mo ago

Yes, it seems as though a politically-aligned congress is ceding lots of its authority to the executive, while the SCOTUS is restraining the rest of the judiciary from checking the executive. The shame of this is, it is in defiance of the design of the Founders, and will take a LONG time to correct, if we don't descent into authoritarianism before it is corrected.

CGMthrowaway 10mo ago

You may be right, but it may be more accurate to say checks and balances are shifting, not failing wholesale. Judicial review of executive actions is stronger and more frequent than its ever been. Congressional power of the purse is secure. And the REINS Act (not yet passed) would require Congress to approve major agency rules before they take effect

estearum 10mo ago
> Congressional power of the purse is secure Which reality do you live in? In my reality, POTUS is doing everything he can to grind down Congress's power of the purse. He's actively pressuring Fed policy, which at its most extreme gives the executive a blank check as it can force the Fed to purchase treasuries, filling the executive's coffers directly. At the same time, they're arguing that pocket rescissions give them the right to avoid spending any individual dollar they do not wish to spend, even if Congress has allocated it. Tell me what gives you confidence that the power of the purse is secure?
- CGMthrowaway 10mo ago
  >In my reality, POTUS is doing everything he can to grind down Congress's power of the purse. And it hasn't been working well. DOGE failed, SCOTUS has not yet issued a final determination on pocket rescissions, and the Fed can only buy treasuries on the secondary market, meaning the bond market is in control. There is also the debt ceiling which requires Congress to raise it.
  - adgjlsfhk1 10mo ago
    potus has been successful in illegally dismantling whole agencies (e.g. usaid)
  - estearum 10mo ago
    DOGE didn't "fail" to maim the power of the purse. It actually achieved that goal. It failed to produce savings for taxpayers. Totally different. SCOTUS "hasn't issued a final determination" on almost any issue put in front of it in Trump 2. Yet they consistently land on "the administration can do what it wants while we delay actually ruling, even if several lower courts have ruled against this outcome after actually hearing the case at length." The Fed's prohibition from buying Treasuries directly is only relevant if the FOMC is actually independent. If it's not, nothing prevents POTUS from saying "the Fed will buy $x in treasuries at $y," directing them to do so, and creating a clear arb opportunity for all the intermediary banks to buy and re-sell their slice. Sure, that'd trigger a financial crisis, but that's kind of the whole problem with idiot demagogues: they trigger such crises as a matter of course.

rayiner 10mo ago

> I think we can clearly see that the interpretation of our laws is extremely partisan at the moment, to the point that what exact text says is basically irrelevant By “at the moment,” you mean “in the 1930s when the Supreme Court bent over backward to uphold FDD’s administrative state, right?” When they effectively overruled the Supreme Court’s 1926 decision in Myers v. United States, right? Because the text of the constitution says this: “The executive Power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America.” Show me how you get from that to executive agencies exercising executive power independent of the President.

adgjlsfhk1 10mo ago
a rule making agency isn't an executive power
- rayiner 10mo ago
  It does exercise executive power, otherwise it wouldn’t be constitutional. Only congress can make laws. When Congress delegates rulemaking authority to an agency, the agency makes rules pursuant to the executive power to execute the laws. For example, Congress can ban “unfair competition.” But it can leave it to the executive agency charged with enforcing the law to define rules for exactly what constitutes unfair competition. That’s permissible because deciding exactly what’s unfair reasonably falls within the scope of enforcement discretion.
dataflow 10mo ago
> Show me how you get from that to executive agencies exercising executive power independent of the President. "[The president] may require the Opinion, in writing, of the principal Officer in each of the executive Departments" Could you please explain why that clause is there if the president can already threaten to fire anyone who doesn't comply with their orders?
- rayiner 10mo ago
  Hamilton thought it was superfluous. Federalist 74 says: > “The President may require the opinion in writing of the principal officer in each of the executive departments upon any subject relating to the duties of their respective offices.” This I consider as a mere redundancy in the plan; as the right for which it provides would result of itself from the office. Note that this provision must be redundant even without a unitary executive. Because otherwise, the implication is the only thing the President can do with principal officers is to ask them for an opinion. Some modern scholars think the provision, though functionally redundant, is there to address a dispute that arose during the debates about executive councils: https://www.yalejreg.com/nc/reconciling-the-unitary-executive-and-the-opinions-clause-by-michael-b-rappaport/ https://www.yalejreg.com/nc/reconciling-the-unitary-executiv... (“Unsurprisingly, the issue of an executive council arose at the Philadelphia Convention. Several proposals to create a council of state or a privy council were offered. Some of the proposed councils would have provided advice to the President but would not have required that he follow it, whereas others might have required that he secure the consent of the council. But each of the proposals was rejected. Instead, the Convention took language from part of one of the executive council proposals – ‘he may require the written opinions of any one or more members” of the council – as a model for the Opinions Clause.’”). So the clause is there not to describe what the principal officers must do, but what the President need not do. The President may but does not need to consult his principal officers before taking action.

FuriouslyAdrift 10mo ago

Not really. Within the Court, the divide is primarily between originalists and pragmatists. This has been a fight going back a long time in legal theory. It had been dominated by pragmatists since the 1920s and the tide started to turn in the late 1980s. The current Court is dominated by originalists. It has little to do with political parties even though originalist thought is more aligned with conservative social and political thinking and pragmatists are more aligned with progressive thinking.

troyvit 10mo ago

If a Democrat gets the presidency in 2028 do you think they'll restore the FCC's independence? I'd be willing to bet not, because no matter which party is in power, they are going to want to continue to concentrate that power.

Amezarak 10mo ago
FDR famously ran the FCC as his personal fiefdom to punish his political enemies. There's nothing new under the sun.
jmward01 10mo ago
Exactly why this is a terrible thing. It isn't liberal or conservative to say 'power accumulation in one person is bad'. We need to be actively stripping the executive, and any entrenched position, of power. Democracy needs decentralized power.