I recently heard an interview with Boston Globe reporter, Charlie Savage, on NPR’s Fresh Air. Mr. Savage has written a series of articles about President Bush’s use of so-called “signing statements.” While this topic may sound about as exciting as chewing on a mouthful of cotton, it turns out to be quite interesting, and revealing of this administration’s desire to push the limits of power of the presidency. Bush has yet to veto a single bill that’s crossed his desk since taking office in 2001. There have been only 8 presidents who didn’t veto a single bill — the last one was James Garfield in 1881, who only served six months before being assassinated. This may be explained by the GOP control over the House and Senate only passing bills that are in line with the administration’s interests. After all, until recently Republicans have been known for their discipline.
However, that discipline has been fraying in the past year as the president’s popularity has sunk and the Iraq war has dragged on. Last year Senator John McCain introduced an amendment to the 2005 defense appropriations bill that would, in short, prohibit the torture of detainees. The White House threatened to veto the bill unless it made an exception for the CIA. Eventually, the bill passed and the president signed it. McCain called it a “done deal.” Probably due to the wrangling leading up to the bill’s passage, journalists (including Mr. Savage) decided to take a look at the final bill, and the President’s signing statement, expecting it to be pretty standard boring legalese saying “I didn’t like it, but I signed it and here’s the law.” Instead it effectively says (in standard boring, obfuscated legalese), “I interpret this part of the law to be meaningless, and therefore will ignore it, and instruct my subordinates to do so as well.”
Puzzling. If he didn’t like it, why not veto it? And so what, he doesn’t like it. It’s still a law, right? Here’s where the interesting part comes up. A signing statement is not just a place for the president to officially bellyache about something he didn’t like. It is an official interpretation of the law, instructing the executive branch how to implement it. And indirectly, the judicial branch, since it looks to signing statements for guidance on interpretation in court. Not only does it not (usually) attract all that nasty media attention (and the attention of Congress) that an official veto would, but a signing statement can also selectively interpret parts of a bill, effectively making it a line-item veto. Although Congress granted line-item veto power to the President in 1997, it was ruled as unconstitutional a year later and struck down by the Supreme Court. The President is only supposed to be able to accept an entire bill as is, or veto it and send the whole thing back to Congress.
After this statement came to light, Mr. Savage started looking at past statements, and found that this kind of thing has been standard operating procedure for this administration. George W. Bush has issued over 500 of them. While past administrations have used this tool in similar ways, none has been this aggressive in essentially reshaping laws to its liking.
The US Constitution states that the executive responsibility is to “take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed.” It seems that this administration has interpreted that to mean faithful to its own goals and ideology.
References:
- Article by Charlie Shaw in the Boston Globe.
- Memorandum posted on the US DOJ site, dated Nov. 3, 1993.
- Bush makes history - a five-year streak without saying ‘no’ Christian Science Monitor
- Line Item Veto May be Revived The Hill
- Editorial at Findlaw about the abuse of signing statements by President Bush.
- McCain, Bush agree on torture ban CNN
