Reply #44: Alito and signing statements.

[slipslidingaway]

http://www.consortiumnews.com/2006/010906a.html

Alito & the Point of No Return

"In 1986, Alito advanced this theory by proposing “interpretive signing statements” from presidents to counter the court’s traditional reliance on congressional intent in assessing the meaning of federal law. Under Bush, these “signing statements” have amounted to rejection of legal restrictions especially as they bear on presidential powers."

From the above article, the six page "plan" for increasing the use of presisential signing statements written in 1986 by Sam Alito.

http://www.archives.gov/news/samuel-alito/accession-060-89-269/Acc060-89-269-box6-SG-LSWG-AlitotoLSWG-Feb1986.pdf



The Problem with Presidential Signing Statements: Their Use and Misuse by the Bush Administration
By JOHN W. DEAN
----
Friday, Jan. 13, 2006

http://writ.news.findlaw.com/dean/20060113.html



Sign Here
Presidential signing statements are more than just executive branch lunacy.
By Dahlia Lithwick
Posted Monday, Jan. 30, 2006, at 5:32 AM ET


"Should we dismiss these statements just because President Bush is so brazen in his claims? So willing to take legal positions that are undefended because they're legally indefensible? Will all this just go away someday, when a court dismisses these statements as excessive and unfounded? No. Because President Bush isn't trying to win this war in the courts. Thus far, he has faced each legal setback as though it never happened; or—more often—he's recast it as a victory. He doesn't care what the courts someday make of his signing statements, just as he didn't care what the courts made of his enemy-combatant claims. He views the courts as irrelevant in his pursuit of this war. These signing statements are dangerous because they repeat and normalize—always using seemingly boilerplate language—claims about the boundless powers of a "unitary executive." By questioning the principle of court review in the McCain statement, Bush again erodes the notion of judicial supremacy—an idea we have lived with since Marbury v. Madison. When he asserts that he—and not the courts—is the final arbiter of his constitutional powers, he is calling for a radical shift in the system of checks and balances.

It's so tempting to laugh off Bush's signing statements as puffed-up, groundless claims that he is all-powerful, all-knowing, and also devastatingly handsome. But this is the president talking and instructing his subordinates—and also outlining a broad legal regime that may not technically be constitutional, but that hardly makes it laughable. These declarations promote a view of the law that may have no merit in the courts but may never have the chance to be resolved there in the first place."

http://www.slate.com/id/2134919/



Another article

http://www.realcities.com/mld/krwashington/news/nation/13568438.htm?source=rss&channel=krwashington_nation