Senator Russ Feingold (D-WI) made an opening statement today at the Senate Judiciary Committee Hearing On the Call To Censure the President.
In his statement he made the case for censure very clear. It was simple, eloquent and to the point.
If the President's legal theory, which is shared by some of our witnesses today, is correct, then FISA is a dead letter, all of the supposed protections for civil liberties contained in the reauthorization of the Patriot Act that we just passed are a cruel hoax, and any future legislation we might pass regarding surveillance or national security is a waste of time and a charade. Under this theory, we no longer have a constitutional system consisting of three co-equal branches of government, we have a monarchy.
The idea here is quite simple. The
Foreign Intelligence Security Act was passed to narrow the scope and limit the
Article II powers of the president.
He says that without this power to legislate the scope of the article II powers, our 3 branch, co-equal consitutional system of government fails. When the executive is above the law, the legislative and judiciary branches no longer have any power and the result is, exactly what Senator Feingold says, a monarchy.
The other point he makes, and I encourage you to read the whole statement, is that any legislation proposed, and both Senator Graham, and Senator Specter have legislation pending, to justify the warrantless domestic spying is a waste of time, since the argument against censure is that the president, under Article II, has the ability to ignore the law.
Finally, there was an implicit endorsement of the illegal activities of the executive branch by the absent members of the judiciary committee. From what I could see through C-SPAN's broadcast these democratic members where missing.
Shame on them.
Edward M. Kennedy
MASSACHUSETTS
Joseph R. Biden, Jr.
DELAWARE
Herbert Kohl
WISCONSIN
Dianne Feinstein
CALIFORNIA
Richard J. Durbin
ILLINOIS
Charles E. Schumer
NEW YORK