McCain and Feingold working to give Pres. Obama line-item veto power?

[WilliamPitt]

And working together on this government contracting reform push Obama is about to announce?

I'm hearing this on MSNBC @ 10:12am EST, for context.

Am I remembering correctly that the GOP congress worked hammer-and-tong to keep Pres. Clinton from having line-item veto power? I think I am.

If MSNBC's report is accurate, then holy poo.

McCain/Feingold rides again.

The GOP base is gonna be piiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiissed.

They are such fans of the last McCain/Feingold project.

:) JOY :)

[billybob537]

1. I guess Grampy McGrumpy hasn't

figured how badly this could SCREW his fractured party
Hey Will LTNS
Edit; 45,000 posts my you,ve been busy.

[WilliamPitt]

4. LTNS?

[billybob537]

8. Long time no see

Last time I cought up with you was the RNC in Manhattan 04 August?
I delivered the Pants on fire mobile!
We need a Boston area meet up!

[WilliamPitt]

10. I'm always around.

:)

[billybob537]

14. One of these days I'll

get off my ass and ride down to Buck's

[tekisui]

2. The Line Item Veto was also declared unconstitutional.

I don't know why they would try it again.

[Renew Deal]

3. I thought the line item veto was unconstitutional

Because of seperation of powers.

[WilliamPitt]

6. Just going by what I heard.

The fact that McCain and Feingold are teaming up again for anything is still going to send the GOP base over the moon.

[bigtree]

16. From 1997 until it was declared unconstitutional in 1998

. . . the Line Item Veto Act provided the President authority to cancel certain individual items contained in a bill or joint resolution that he had signed into law. The law allowed the President to cancel only three types of fiscal items: a dollar amount of discretionary budget authority, an item of new direct spending, and a tax change benefiting a class of 100 or fewer. While the Act has not been repealed, the Supreme Court in Clinton v. City of New York, 118 S. Ct. 2091 (1998), struck down the Line Item Veto Act as unconstitutional.

http://thomas.loc.gov/home/lawsmade.bysec/presidential.html#lineitem

CLINTON v. CITY OF NEW YORK
http://supct.law.cornell.edu/supct/search/display.html?terms=line%20item%20veto&url=/supct/html/97-1374.ZO.html

[goforit]

5. Setting Obama up to eject the earmarks. If Obama doesn't he will br responsible.

[Rashel]

7. Freepers heads will explode. 4 or 5 months ago when McCain was campaigning

they'd kick people off of the site for badmouthing
McCain. They are such lemmings.

[Winterblues]

9. Actually the "Line Item Veto" was in the "Contract with America"

It was passed by a Republican Congress and then found unconstitutional by the Extreme Court, so Clinton never got to weild it.

[WilliamPitt]

11. Why on Earth did I hear them talking about it this morning?

[bigtree]

12. separation of powers is important

. . . line-item veto would put too much power in the hands of the Executive.


|| Federalist No. 47 ||

The Particular Structure of the New Government and the Distribution of Power Among Its Different Parts

Friday, February 1, 1788.

Author: James Madison

To the People of the State of New York:

HAVING reviewed the general form of the proposed government and the general mass of power allotted to it, I proceed to examine the particular structure of this government, and the distribution of this mass of power among its constituent parts. One of the principal objections inculcated by the more respectable adversaries to the Constitution, is its supposed violation of the political maxim, that the legislative, executive, and judiciary departments ought to be separate and distinct. In the structure of the federal government, no regard, it is said, seems to have been paid to this essential precaution in favor of liberty. The several departments of power are distributed and blended in such a manner as at once to destroy all symmetry and beauty of form, and to expose some of the essential parts of the edifice to the danger of being crushed by the disproportionate weight of other parts. No political truth is certainly of greater intrinsic value, or is stamped with the authority of more enlightened patrons of liberty, than that on which the objection is founded.

The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many, and whether hereditary, self-appointed, or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny.


more: http://thomas.loc.gov/home/histdox/fed_47.html

[OHdem10]

13. I thought the SCOTUS had ruled against Line Item Vetoes.

It will become a tool of Partisan Ship. When GOP in Power
they will line item all Democrats Spending. Yes our Party would
use it to line item all Republican Spending.

Was it Reagan, one President sent a bill back to Congress
and refuse to sign it until both parties cut out some "pork."

[bigtree]

15. Justice Stevens delivered the opinion of the Court.

WILLIAM J. CLINTON V. CITY OF NEW YORK, 524 U.S. 417 (1998)
--Opinion

{big snip}

Although they are implicit in what we have already written, the profound importance of these cases makes it appropriate to emphasize three points.

First, we express no opinion about the wisdom of the procedures authorized by the Line Item Veto Act. Many members of both major political parties who have served in the Legislative and the Executive Branches have long advocated the enactment of such procedures for the purpose of “ensuring greater fiscal accountability in Washington.” The text of the Act was itself the product of much debate and deliberation in both Houses of Congress and that precise text was signed into law by the President. We do not lightly conclude that their action was unauthorized by the Constitution. We have, however, twice had full argument and briefing on the question and have concluded that our duty is clear.

Second, although appellees challenge the validity of the Act on alternative grounds, the only issue we address concerns the “finely wrought” procedure commanded by the Constitution. We have been favored with extensive debate about the scope of Congress’ power to delegate law-making authority, or its functional equivalent, to the President. The excellent briefs filed by the parties and their amici curiae have provided us with valuable historical information that illuminates the delegation issue but does not really bear on the narrow issue that is dispositive of these cases. Thus, because we conclude that the Act’s cancellation provisions violate Article I, §7, of the Constitution, we find it unnecessary to consider the District Court’s alternative holding that the Act “impermissibly disrupts the balance of powers among the three branches of government.”

Third, our decision rests on the narrow ground that the procedures authorized by the Line Item Veto Act are not authorized by the Constitution. The Balanced Budget Act of 1997 is a 500-page document that became “Public Law 105—33” after three procedural steps were taken: (1) a bill containing its exact text was approved by a majority of the Members of the House of Representatives; (2) the Senate approved precisely the same text; and (3) that text was signed into law by the President. The Constitution explicitly requires that each of those three steps be taken before a bill may “become a law.” Art. I, §7. If one paragraph of that text had been omitted at any one of those three stages, Public Law 105—33 would not have been validly enacted. If the Line Item Veto Act were valid, it would authorize the President to create a different law–one whose text was not voted on by either House of Congress or presented to the President for signature. Something that might be known as “Public Law 105—33 as modified by the President” may or may not be desirable, but it is surely not a document that may “become a law” pursuant to the procedures designed by the Framers of Article I, §7, of the Constitution.

If there is to be a new procedure in which the President will play a different role in determining the final text of what may “become a law,” such change must come not by legislation but through the amendment procedures set forth in Article V of the Constitution.


http://supct.law.cornell.edu/supct/search/display.html?terms=line%20item%20veto&url=/supct/html/97-1374.ZO.html

[tonysam]

21. I Think It was Robert Byrd

who was the biggest critic of the line-item veto.

There's nothing that can be done about it. Legislation is all or nothing.

[bigtree]

22. I thought about citing Byrd - a wealth there . . .

. . . but he's not real popular here with some folks. I'd go back to the Federalist Papers (#47) or refer to the SC ruling in Clinton V. NY to flesh out the objections.

[tritsofme]

17. Hitting the sauce a little early today? Republicans gave Clinton the line item veto, and the SCOTUS

struck it down.

Line item veto was part of the Contract on America IIRC.

[WilliamPitt]

18. I'm not, but apparently the MSNBC guys are.

[bamacrat]

19. You heard right.

Its being reported all over now. It says the bill wont give Obama the same veto power the previous bill did, it would only allow for budget vetos. Need to get rid of all republican earmarks, how can they put that in then bitch and moan over what a horrible thing this is for the country. Douches

[WilliamPitt]

20. OK, that makes more sense.

Thanks!