It takes a lot for a tenured professor to be fired, but it recently happened to Frances Widdowson. As reported by Fox News, Widdowson “who taught economics, justice and policy studies, was fired from Mount Royal University (MRU) in Calgary, Alberta, last December after stoking controversy for comments criticizing BLM, which she said ‘destroyed MRU’ to such an extent that she ‘doesn’t recognize the institution anymore.’”

In addition, “Widdowson, who studied Indigenization initiatives for 20 years, also took flak for claiming that Canada’s controversial residential school program offered Indigenous children the opportunity ‘to get an education that normally they wouldn’t have received.’ Her comments came amid a national backlash over the discovery of unmarked graves at the Kamloops Indian Residential School in British Columbia.”

And for that, she was fired, no doubt with the help of a Change.org petition titled, “Fire France Widdowson – a Racist Professor at MRU.”

To quote the petition itself, “Frances Widdowson is a racist professor who works at Mount Royal University. This is a call to demand that the university condemns Widdowson’s hateful actions against the BIPOC community and that she is terminated for her racist remarks.

“Mount Royal University has still yet to make a statement regarding Widdowson’s racist actions and continues to employ her.

“In ignoring the racist actions of people in power, we directly contribute to the systemic racism within our society.”

Now, you may or may not agree with Widdowson’s comments, and you may or may not agree that they were racist.

But she certainly had every right to express these views as a college professor, especially a tenured professor. To deny her that right is to deny free speech, plain and simple. As Elon Musk recently said,

“A good sign as to whether there is free speech is someone you don’t like allowed to say something you don’t like. And if that is the case, then we have free speech.”

But what makes the firing of Widdowson all the more egregious is that those on the left are allowed to engage in all kinds of outrageous hate speech without any penalty in the least or, certainly, without losing their job. (I have documented this radical shift to the left on American campuses in the chapter “The Campus Thought Police” in my new book The Silencing of the Lambs: The Ominous Rise of Cancel Culture and How We Can Overcome It.)

For example, in April 2020, in response to Kansas lawmakers who argued against a complete shutdown of religious services due to COVID, Philip Nel, an English professor at Kansas State University tweeted, “Local branch of death cult, aka @KansasGOP, votes to exempt churches from quarantine rules, endangering the lives of us all.”

That sounds pretty hateful to me. But was Nel censored for this tweet, let alone fired? Not a chance. (For the record, he’s the author of “Was the Cat in the Hat Black?: The Hidden Racism of Children’s Literature” and “Tales for Little Rebels: A Collection of Radical Children’s Literature.”)

Last December, Professor Monica Casper, dean of the College of Arts and Letters at San Diego State University, tweeted this with reference to the Dobbs v. Jackson U.S. Supreme Court case, which could possibly overturn Roe v. Wade: “Two sexual predators, a white lady, and some racists walk into a courtroom…#SCOTUS #AbortionIsHealthcare.”

What a despicable characterization of an immensely important pro-life case.

Does she still have her job? Is she still dean? Take a guess.

But perhaps these comments were too mild, hardly worthy of dismissal or censure.

How about these comments? As reported by Prof. Jonathan Turley on February 2:

“An Australian professor of “moral psychology” used Twitter to call for the death of Trump supporters.  Neither Twitter nor his colleagues objected to Macquarie University Associate Professor Mark Alfano calling for ‘more of this please‘ after reading that a Trump supporter died in the recent Capitol Hill riot. He also called such deaths ‘comedy.’ He is not the first academic to call for such violence or defend killings. We previously discussed Rhode Island Professor Erik Loomis who writes for the site Lawyers, Guns, and Money and declared that he saw ‘nothing wrong’ with the killing of a conservative protester. (A view defended by other academics). Other professors have simply called for all ‘Republicans to suffer.’ What is striking is that such views are neither barred by Twitter nor, according to a conservative site that broke this story, denounced at his university.”

What a surprise!

Another professor openly wished for the death of Republican lawmakers who were shot at a baseball game in 2017, while in 2018, yet another professor posted this:

“OK, officially, I now hate white people. I am a white people, for God’s sake, but can we keep them — us — us out of my neighborhood? I just went to Harlem Shake on 124 and Lenox for a Classic burger to go, that would [be] my dinner, and the place is overrun with little Caucasian [expletives] who know their parents will approve of anything they do.”

He actually had a lot more to say, but this gives you an idea. Were either of these professors fired? Nope. Were they censored?

In the first example, citing Trinity College professor Johnny Eric Williams, he had also written that “all self-identified white people (no exceptions) are invested in and collude with systematic white racism/white supremacy.” And he tweeted that “whiteness is terrorism,” defending his comments rather than apologizing for them.

As a result of his “let them die” wish for the wounded GOP lawmakers, he was temporarily suspended, shortly after which he was granted tenure. I am not making this up.

In the case of the second professor quoted here, James Livingston, a tenured history professor at Rutgers, the university decided to sanction him but then reversed its position.

Yet Prof. Widdowson, a longtime tenured professor, was fired for comments that were far less offensive than any of these (and, the truth be told, probably quite accurate).

That’s the reality on our campuses today, and I barely scratched the surface of some of the extremism that exists.

The good news is that Widdowson is fighting back with vigor, wit, and determination (in the courts too), calling out the “woke” crowd.

May freedom and equality prevail.

This article was originally published by AskDrBrown.org.

On January 26th, various news outlets reported that U.S. Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer, who was appointed in 1994, planned to announce his retirement. This announcement was followed by multiple reports suggesting that Justice Breyer may have been ushered out by political activists/strategists within the Democratic Party. One report by FoxNews.com claimed that “groups such as Black Lives Matter and Women’s March launched an effort calling for the justice’s retirement.”

With the midterm elections just eight months away and a “red wave” predicted, time was of the essence. U.S. Senate Democrats could not afford to wait to fill the seat occupied by the oldest liberal member of the Court, even if that meant ushering Breyer out before he was ready to go.

Last Friday, President Joe Biden nominated federal appeals court Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson to fill Breyer’s seat. According to background information provided by the White House, Judge Jackson, who currently serves as a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, was born in Washington, D.C. and grew up in Miami, Florida. She earned a BA from Harvard University in 1993 (magna cum laude), and then attended Harvard Law School, graduating cum laude in 1996. Judge Jackson clerked for a variety of judges after earning her JD, and in 1999 clerked for Justice Breyer. She worked in private practice and then as a public defender.

President Barack Obama nominated Judge Jackson as vice chair of the U.S. Sentencing Commission in 2009. She was confirmed unanimously for that position by the U.S. Senate in 2010 and served there until she was nominated by President Obama for a position on the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. She was again confirmed by the U.S. Senate in 2013. Judge Jackson served on the District Court until 2021, when President Joe Biden nominated her for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. The U.S. Senate again confirmed her appointment in 2021 by a 53-44 vote with three Republicans joining all 50 Democrats voting “yea:” Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, Susan Collins of Maine, and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska.

Judge Jackson is currently visiting Senators as she begins the interview process for the U.S. Supreme Court. The U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee will commence confirmation hearings. If she is confirmed by the U.S. Senate, Judge Jackson would be the second youngest justice on the court—behind Justice Amy Coney Barrett—and the first Black woman to serve as a U.S. Supreme Court Justice. Of course, President Biden publicly and proudly announced to the nation that the race and gender of his nominee were pre-qualifying conditions for his consideration. (White males need not apply.)

So, what about her judicial philosophy about the U.S. Constitution, the sanctity of life and religious freedom? Well, according to an article by law professor Jonathan Turley,

What is most notable of the statements of support for Judge Jackson is how little is said about her judicial philosophy or approach to the law. The fact is that we have a comparably thin record of opinions in comparison to recent nominees. While she obviously has opinions as a district court judge, there are few opinions that shed light on her judicial philosophy. That is not surprising for a trial judge who issues hundreds of insular decisions on trial issues or outcomes. This is not about the years of experience on the bench, which I have repeatedly noted is a great strength in the nomination. It simply means that we have fewer opinions offering substantive insights into her approach to legal interpretation. The question is whether we will learn substantially more in this confirmation.

We can hope that the confirmation hearings for Judge Jackson, which are scheduled for March 21 through 24, will flesh out more about her views on key issues and her judicial philosophy.

Kelly Shackelford, President, CEO, and Chief Counsel for First Liberty Institute has a different perspective. He isn’t waiting to sound the alarm:

In nominating Ketanji Brown Jackson, President Biden is selecting a judicial activist for the Supreme Court. Her record from the beginning of her career shows hostility to religious liberty, free speech, and other constitutional rights. The American people do not want a liberal extremist on the Supreme Court. If confirmed, Judge Jackson’s judicial activism will place the constitutional rights of all Americans in jeopardy.

Other concerns about Judge Jackson’s positions have been raised by our friends at Family Research Council and Family Policy Alliance.

Billionaire financier Jeffrey Epstein socialized with the rich and powerful, harboring a sordid hidden life that came to light in 2008, landing him in prison for the solicitation of underage girls for sex.  Epstein was infamous for his private Boeing 727 airliner nicknamed the “Lolita Express,” which ferried guests including Bill Clinton and a bevy of young girls allegedly pressed into prostitution at his Caribbean estate dubbed “Orgy Island.”

His laughable 13-month sentence after being accused by more than 40 minor girls of sexual abuse is a testament to his connections in high places.  Those guests included the aforementioned former President Bill Clinton, who reportedly ditched his Secret Service detail to travel to the island.  On July 8, Clinton issued a statement claiming that he “knows nothing about the terrible crimes Jeffrey Epstein pleaded guilty to in Florida some years ago, or those with which he has been recently charged in New York.”  The former president stated that he took “a total of four trips on Jeffrey Epstein’s airplane.” Flight logs, however, reveal that he had been on the plane as many as 26 times.

The list of prominent names alleged to have partaken of the pleasures of the flesh aboard the Lolita Express en route to Orgy Island include former national security adviser Sandy Berger, Naomi Campbell, former Harvard president Larry Summers, actor Kevin Spacey and comedian Chris Tucker.

Justice may yet be served.  This week Epstein was served with a federal indictment charged with the sexual trafficking of minors and one count of conspiracy to engage in sex trafficking of minor.  The indictment alleges that he “sexually exploited and abused dozens of minor girls,” some as young as 14, describing the victims as “particularly vulnerable to exploitation.”  Miami Herald journalist Julie K. Brown, who helped break the story, believes that Epstein may have also been providing young girls to others as “sex slaves.”

These are serious charges, which according to renowned legal scholar and attorney Jonathan Turley, could “produce a sentence of 45 years in prison if Epstein were convicted.”

It’s important to keep in mind that people are not convicted in the “court of public opinion,” neither does our legal system allow for “guilt by association.”  Yet if true, the charges raise questions about how much Epstein’s associates knew about his sexual exploitation of young girls – and whether they chose to turn a blind eye.

Courtney Wild states that she was 14 when Epstein’s abuse began, and stated after his arrest:  “I have fought so long to finally see Epstein brought to justice. I didn’t believe the news that he was arrested until I saw him in custody with my own eyes. I want my voice to encourage others to come forward,” she said. “We are stronger together.”

Not a few lamented that Epstein’s initial sweetheart plea deal back in 2008 was evidence of the “elite” escaping having to pay for their crimes.  This week’s arrest and indictment give hope that the wheels of justice, while sometimes turning painfully slow, do continue to spin to their inexorable conclusion.  Doubtlessly more famous names will surface in the days and weeks to come. Let the chips fall where they may and let us hope and pray that this scourge of the sexual abuse of minors will be uprooted from our society.

IFI Fall Banquet with Franklin Graham!
We are excited to announce that at this year’s IFI banquet, our keynote speaker will be none other than Rev. Franklin Graham, President & CEO of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association and Christian evangelist & missionary. This year’s event will be at the Tinley Park Convention Center on Nov. 1st.

Learn more HERE.

Audacity: unrestrained impudence, impropriety, gall

Last week President Barack Obama delivered his farewell address. Aside from his lovely tribute to his family, there were more than a few portions of his address that raised eyebrows, hackles, and dander.

For 240 years, our nation’s call to citizenship has given work and purpose to each new generation. It’s what led…slaves to brave that makeshift railroad to freedom. It’s what pulled immigrants and refugees across oceans and the Rio Grande, pushed women to reach for the ballot….It’s why GIs gave their lives at Omaha Beach and Iwo Jima; Iraq and Afghanistan—why men and women from Selma to Stonewall were prepared to give theirs as well.

It’s both audacious and offensive for Obama to compare the struggle of blacks for freedom from slavery, segregation, and Jim Crow laws or the sacrifice of soldiers fighting to defeat evil totalitarian regimes to the protests of homosexuals clamoring for America to affirm and celebrate homoeroticism.

Obama then boasted about his galling impropriety, spuriously couching it in language that appeals to our better selves:

If I had told you eight years ago that America…would win marriage equality… you might have said our sights were set a little too high.  But that’s what we did.

Obama and five U.S. Supreme Court Justices did not win marriage “equality.” They imposed a radical revision of the legal definition of marriage on the entire country. Equality demands that like things be treated alike. Equality does not demand that we treat unlike things as if they were alike. An intrinsically sterile union of two people of the same sex is as different from a union composed of two people of different sexes as men are from women (which is a difference that even homosexuals acknowledge is real, substantive, and profound). Homosexuals have always been free to marry. They’ve been as free to marry as polyamorists have been. They weren’t fighting for a right they were denied. They were fighting for the unilateral right to revise the legal definition of marriage.

Obama inadvertently alluded to this when he referred to “reinvention”:

Our youth, our drive, our diversity and openness, our boundless capacity for risk and reinvention means that the future should be ours. But that potential will only be realized if our democracy works. Only if our politics better reflects the decency of our people.

Obama has used every extra-legal and unconstitutional means at his disposal to force people to share restrooms, locker rooms, and shelters with persons of the opposite sex. He has undermined true marriage and eagerly endorsed family structures that deny children their intrinsic right to be raised by a mother and father. He refers to people who publicly proclaim their embrace of homoeroticism as heroes. He has vigorously supported the putative “right” of women to have the humans growing in their wombs killed and believes taxpayers should subsidize this barbarity. And Obama has the audacity to talk about decency.

Obama-the-Audacious continued his reverie in la-la land:

 “Now, I’ve lived long enough to know that race relations are better than they were 10, or 20, or 30 years ago, no matter what some folks say.”

Surely Obama jests. More likely he lies. Well, perhaps race relations are better than they were in 1996 or 1986, but are those improvements the result of Obama’s words and actions? More to the point, are race relations better now than they were eight years ago, before Obama assumed office?

In an interview that aired shortly before Obama’s farewell address, liberal pundit Stephanopoulos asked him  about his record on race relations: “The heart of your promise when you first burst on the national scene, bringing everyone together. And you look now and most African-Americans think we’ve gone backwards on race relations over the last eight years. What do you say to that?”

Obama responded, “I am absolutely convinced that race relations on the whole are actually better now than they were 20 years—.” An incredulous Stephanopoulos interrupted him: “Better now?”

Sly rhetorician that he is, Obama changed the question Stephanopoulos had asked. Stephanopoulos asked about the trajectory of race relations during Obama’s eight-year tenure. He did not ask if race relations were better compared to race relations in 1996.

Obama, whose honey-tongue (or is it forked tongue?) masks his extremist and divisive cultural agenda, continued:

…[I]f our democracy is to work in this increasingly diverse nation, then each one of us need to try to heed the advice of a great character in American fiction—Atticus Finch–who said “You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view…until you climb into his skin and walk around in it.”

Has Obama walked around in the skin of orthodox Christians—especially those who are being persecuted for their faith? While “progressive” business owners have the freedom to live in accordance with their deeply held convictions by refusing to provide baked goods, music, or dresses, orthodox Christians are sued for doing likewise. One dress designer justified her refusal to design a dress for Melania Trump: [W]e consider our voice an expression of our artistic and philosophical ideas.” Apparently Obama spends more time walking around in designer clothes and little time walking around in the skin of Melissa and Aaron Klein who lost their bakery business and were fined $135,000 because of their artistic, philosophical, and religious ideas about marriage.

Obama warned about the deep distrust Americans have of government:

When trust in our institutions is low, we should…insist on the principles of transparency and ethics in public service. 

When Obama entered office he promised his would be “the most transparent administration in history,” but in a scathing report for the Committee to Protect Journalists, Washington Post vice president at large Leonard Downie Jr. wrote that the Obama “administration’s war on leaks and other efforts to control information are the most aggressive I’ve seen since the Nixon administration.”

In this report, New York Times chief Washington correspondent David Sanger described the Obama administration as “the most closed, control freak administration I’ve ever covered.” And New York Times public editor Margaret Sullivan said, “it’s turning out to be the administration of unprecedented secrecy and unprecedented attacks on a free press.”

Obama continues to foment division even in his waning days. He commuted the sentence of traitor Bradley (aka “Chelsea”) Manning who was convicted of 17 charges resulting from leaking 700,000 pages of classified or sensitive government documents to Wikileaks that, according to experts, resulted in incalculable and ongoing damage to national security. Obama commuted his sentence from 35 years to 7, a commutation that even Democrats oppose.

Obama also offends with his audacious reference to Manning as “she” despite the fact that Manning has not yet been castrated and despite the scientific fact that castration and cross-sex hormone-doping cannot turn Manning into a “she.” This is particularly ironic in light Obama’s supposed commitment to science and reason:

But without some common baseline of facts, without a willingness to admit new information, and concede that your opponent might be making a fair point, and that science and reason matter, then we’re going to keep talking past each other, and we’ll make common ground and compromise impossible.

Surely a scientifically-grounded, reasonable man like Obama knows that it’s not actually possible for Manning ever to be a woman. Even a child can tell that he’s a man in the empress’ new gown.

In his farewell address, Obama proclaimed “Our Constitution is a remarkable, beautiful gift.” Equally remarkable, his nose didn’t grow when he said it.

If he actually did believe our Constitution is a beautiful gift, he wouldn’t have abused it. In a congressional hearing, Left-leaning and well-respected constitutional scholar Jonathan Turley warned about the danger to the Republic posed by Obama’s abuse of executive actions to legislate:

The danger is quite severe. The problem with what the president is doing is that he’s not simply posing a danger to the constitutional system. He’s becoming the very danger the Constitution was designed to avoid. 

At the beginning of this article, I provided the definition of audacity—well, I provided one definition of audacity. There’s another. Audacity also means “boldness” or “daring.” As Obama at long last leaves office, let’s not follow in his impudent, at times even galling footsteps. Let’s step into the public square with boldness, constrained by our remarkable Constitution and unsullied by impropriety.

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Conservative friends, if it weren’t clear to you already that the halcyon days for theologically orthodox people of faith in America are over, read the ominous, hostile, and arrogant words of Mark Tushnet, William Nelson Cromwell professor of law at Harvard Law School:

The culture wars are over; they lost, we won…. For liberals, the question now is how to deal with the losers in the culture wars. That’s mostly a question of tactics. My own judgment is that taking a hard line (“You lost, live with it”) is better than trying to accommodate the losers, who—remember—defended, and are defending, positions that liberals regard as having no normative pull at all. Trying to be nice to the losers didn’t work well after the Civil War, nor after Brown. (And taking a hard line seemed to work reasonably well in Germany and Japan after 1945.) I should note that LGBT activists in particular seem to have settled on the hard-line approach, while some liberal academics defend more accommodating approaches. When specific battles in the culture wars were being fought, it might have made sense to try to be accommodating after a local victory, because other related fights were going on, and a hard line might have stiffened the opposition in those fights. But the war’s over, and we won.

Conservatives are the equivalent of racists and Nazis because they believe human beings whose lives begin at conception have a right to exist and that marriage has an intrinsic nature central to which is sexual differentiation. No more need for politically expedient rhetorical deception about tolerance and diversity. Carpe Diem, Tushnet proclaims. To the victors belong the spoils, which to “progressives” like Tushnet just might include the presumptive “right” to abrogate the religious liberty of conservative losers.

What accounts for Tushnet’s cocksureness? Tushnet makes clear that it derives from the current composition of the courts:

Several generations of law students and their teachers grew up with federal courts dominated by conservatives. Not surprisingly, they found themselves wandering in the wilderness, looking for any sign of hope. The result: Defensive-crouch constitutionalism, with every liberal position asserted nervously, its proponents looking over their shoulders for retaliation by conservatives….

It’s time to stop. Right now more than half of the judges sitting on the courts of appeals were appointed by Democratic presidents…the same appears to be true of the district courts. And, those judges no longer have to be worried about reversal by the Supreme Court if they take aggressively liberal positions.

Now that the judiciary is controlled by liberals, Tushnet argues that “Liberals should be compiling lists of cases to be overruled at the first opportunity on the ground that they were wrong the day they were decided,” and that they should “Aggressively exploit the ambiguities and loopholes in unfavorable precedents that aren’t worth overruling” [emphasis Tushnet’s].

Tushnet clerked for Thurgood Marshall and was instrumental in shaping and articulating Marshall’s position in Roe v. Wade which, in turn, influenced Harry Blackmun. Tushnet, in a  “significant letter” written for Marshall and sent to Harry Blackmun said this:

I am inclined to agree that drawing the line at viability accommodates the interests at stake better than drawing it at the end of the first trimester. Given the difficulties which many women may have in believing that they are pregnant and in deciding to seek an abortion, I fear that the earlier date may not in practice serve the interests of those women, which your opinion does seek to serve.

…

It is implicit in your opinion that at some point the State’s interest in preserving the potential life of the unborn child overrides any individual interests of the women. I would be disturbed if that point were set before viability, and I am afraid that the opinion’s present focus on the end of the first trimester would lead states to prohibit abortions completely at any later date.

Professor Tushnet, a prolific writer and non-observant Jew, is the father of Eve Tushnet, a prolific writer and theologically orthodox Catholic who identifies as a lesbian but because of her deep faith, has chosen a life of celibacy. Eve Tushnet was “raised somewhere between atheism and Reform Judaism,” and “entered the Catholic Church in 1998, during her sophomore year at Yale University.”

Is Mark Tushnet’s daughter one of the losers against whom Professor Tushnet seeks a hard line?

The Obama Administration’s executive overreach, criticized even by liberal legal scholar Jonathan Turley, has alerted many conservatives to the imbalance of power between the legislative and executive branches which in theory should be co-equal. “Progressives” are taking their gloves off and putting their jackboots on. They’re hungry and seeking to devour whatever morsels of liberty conservatives yet retain. Perhaps Tushnet’s clanging voice will be the alarm needed to arouse slumbering conservatives before their plate is empty and progressives arrive at our church doors slavering at the cup and gnawing at the host.

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Recently, “progressive” George Washington University Law Professor Jonathan Turley testified before the House Judiciary Committee on the dangerous expansion of Executive Branch power under the Obama Administration. This would be an excellent resource for high school students to study, both those in public schools and home schools.

Here is an excerpt from his prepared remarks:

I recently testified before this Committee on the history and function of the separation of powers in our system.1 I also discussed how, in my view, President Obama has repeatedly violated this doctrine in the circumvention of Congress in areas ranging from health care to immigration law to environmental law. I will not repeat that discussion here because this hearing is not about the existence of such violations but the possible corrective measures that can be taken in light of those violations.

Given the issues at stake in this debate, it is vital that we speak plainly about the current conflicts between the Executive Branch and the Legislative Branch. We are in the midst of a constitutional crisis with sweeping implications for our system of government. There has been a massive gravitational shift of authority to the Executive Branch that threatens the stability and functionality of our tripartite system. To be sure, this shift did not begin with President Obama. However, it has accelerated at an alarming rate under this Administration. These changes are occurring in a political environment with seemingly little oxygen for dialogue, let alone compromise. Indeed, the current anaerobic conditions are breaking down the muscle of the constitutional system that protects us all. Of even greater concern is the fact that the other two branches appear passive, if not inert, as the Executive Branch has assumed such power.

As someone who voted for President Obama and agrees with many of his policies, it is often hard to separate the ends from the means of presidential action. Indeed, despite decades of thinking and writing about the separation of powers, I have had momentary lapses where I privately rejoiced in seeing actions on goals that I share, even though they were done in the circumvention of Congress. For example, when President Obama unilaterally acted on greenhouse gas pollutants, I was initially relieved. I agree entirely with the priority that he has given this issue. However, it takes an act of willful blindness to ignore that the greenhouse regulations were implemented only after Congress rejected such measures and that a new sweeping regulatory scheme is now being promulgated solely upon the authority of the President. We are often so committed to a course of action that we conveniently dismiss the means as a minor issue in light of the goals of the Administration. Many have embraced the notion that all is fair in love and politics. However, as I have said too many times before Congress, in our system it is often more important how we do something than what we do. Priorities and policies (and presidents) change. What cannot change is the system upon which we all depend for our rights and representation.

Convenience has long been the enemy of principle in politics. It is not enough to refer to the value of a program to justify its extraconstitutional means. Such constitutional relativism cuts the entire system free of its moorings; leaving the system adrift in a sea of politics where the ability to act is treated as synonymous with the authority to act. There is no license in our system to act, as President Obama has promised, “with or without Congress”3 in these areas. During periods of political division, compromise is clearly often hard to come by. That reflects a divided country as a whole. Such opposition cannot be the justification for circumvention of the legislative branch….

The current crisis is the result not simply of executive overreach but also of judicial avoidance in the face of that growing encroachment. The courts are now absent—without constitutional leave—in the midst of one of the most fundamental conflicts in the history of our country. That will make corrective measures all the more important (and all the more difficult) for Congress.

…

The classic check on executive over-reaching is the power of the purse. While the President may control the machinery of the state, it is Congress that supplies the gas needed to run those machines. However, the idea of the purse strings as a meaningful check on executive power is often presented in highly generalized and unrealistic terms. Congress is unlikely to cause a cascading failure by cutting off all of the funding for an agency or even a subagency office. More importantly, the Executive Branch routinely moves billions of dollars around in discretionary or undesignated funding. Cutting off the funding of a given part of the government does not have immediate impacts and may in fact not prevent funding as intended.

The Obama Administration has shown how the power of the purse has diminished under modern fiscal systems.

…

To be clear, I do not view President Obama as a dictator, but I do view him as a danger in his aggregation of executive power. It is not his motives but his means that I question. It is the danger described by Louis Brandeis in his dissent in Olmstead v. United States,37 where he warned that the “greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well meaning but without understanding.”

…

We are now at the constitutional tipping point for our system. If balance is to be reestablished, it must begin before this President leaves office and that will likely require every possible means to reassert legislative authority.

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