Why did Arlen do it? Because of his own political survival? Because the Republican Party moved far to the Right? Arlen Specter said it best when he said yesterday, "I am the Senator of the people of Pennsylvania, not the Senator for the Republican Party." He wants to leave a legacy befitting a 79-year-old Senior Senator from Pennsylvania, a five-term veteran who has served his constituency for 29 years.
I believe that Specter made a deal with the Obama White House, one brokered through Joe Biden: Specter would switch, quite publicly, to the Democratic Party, thus giving them a filibuster-proof majority. They in turn would guarantee to him their support of three pieces of legislation that will roll back the massive Presidential power grabs we experienced under the Bush Administration. These could be passed by Memorial Day.
Specter revealed the real reason for his switch today in the New York Review of Books: the passage of three major pieces of legislation remove dangerous powers from the President’s hands, powers that, combined, make the President an unstoppable dictator. Presumably this legislation will pass even if every Republican Senator votes against it, and President Obama will sign it.
What Specter would halt is the power of the President to spy without warrants upon American citizens, and to write Executive Orders, even in secret, that overrule Acts of Congress. Specter announced today that he is putting forward legislation that will end these powers "as soon as possible".
The package consists of:
- Legislation to require the Supreme Court to review questions of the constitutionality of warrantless wiretapping programs, wiretapping that have been decided in favor of the Bush administration by lower courts;
- The reintroduction of legislation that keeps the courts open to suits filed against several major telephone companies that allegedly facilitated the Bush administration's warrantless wiretapping program. Although Congress granted immunity to the telephone companies in July 2008, this issue may yet be successfully revisited since the courts have not yet ruled on the legality of the immunity provision.
- Most importantly, the reintroduction of his legislation from 2006 and 2007 (the "Presidential Signing Statements Act") to prohibit courts from relying on, or deferring to, presidential signing statements when determining the meaning of any Act of Congress. "These statements, sometimes issued when the president signs a bill into law, have too often been used to undermine congressional intent."
Why do I think Specter made this deal? These pieces of legislation are his Constitutional legacy. Specter has spent the latter part of his Senatorial career protecting the Constitution, sometimes against the fierce opposition of his own party’s leadership. Specter has stared his own mortality n the face twice during the bush administration, with treatment for Hodgkin’s Lymphoma both in 2005 and 2008. His own Presidential Signing Statements Act was introduced after he got back to the Senate after his first lymphoma treatment, but his own party destroyed its chances in the partisan support of the President. "Earlier versions of my legislation went nowhere because of the obvious impossibility of obtaining two-thirds majorities in each house to override an expected veto by President Bush," his NYRB article states. After that legislation failed, he was treated for lymphoma again. He must wonder what his odds are of beating this cancer a third time, and does not want to leave the Senate with these issues unresolved. "In the new Congress, my legislation has a better chance of mustering a majority vote and being signed into law by President Obama."
The Senior Senator from Pennsylvania could have no greater statement chiseled on his monument than that he guaranteed our Country remained a Democracy rather than an Autocracy. The importance of Specter’s view of himself as the son of Pennsylvania cannot be underestimated. Pennsylvania is the Keystone State because it is the site of the foundation of American Freedom and democracy. The First Continental Congress met in Philadelphia. The Articles of Confederation were written in Pennsylvania. Philadelphia’s Constitution Hall was the site of the forging of the Constitution itself. Valley Forge remains the symbol of America’s ability to fight for its vision of Democracy even through the coldest of winters and harshest specters of defeat (Let’s leave out that it was actually the encampment at Morristown NJ that was the coldest and most miserable – but hey, Valley Forge has the reputation, says proud New Jersey girl.) Pennsylvania is also known as the Quaker State, because it was founded by William Penn as a home for Quakers persecuted by the religious and political certainties of the Puritans. William Penn's First Frame of Government for Pennsylvania guaranteed liberty of conscience. Quakers had faced hostility in other colonies because they opposed religious ritual, taking oaths, violence, war and military service. Penn’s Frame became one of the models for our own Constitution.
Specter has always seen himself as a proud Pennsylvanian. But foremost, he views himself as an American Constitutional scholar, who has fought for the tripartite Balance of Powers enshrined in the document forged in his home state. Who knows the dismay he felt when he realized that his party, the Grand Old Party, was willing to toss aside Democracy and the Constitution in order to gain pure political power? Had they no constitutional principles at all? No wonder he stated that the Party had moved away from him.
Well, he has taught them a great lesson in Constitutional history. He has given their enemies the power that they need to achieve the passage of any legislation, humiliating the GOP. And he has done this in order to guarantee speedy passage of the very legislation that will remove the power of the autocrat from the Democratic President – the powers that the GOP thought would ensure their perpetual rule!. Specter himself believes that Obama will make good his promises to him and the country, promises made when Obama was campaigning. He believes that, as a former Senator, Obama understands that the balance of powers must be preserved. And that is why he trusts the Obama administration enough to make this deal.
Specter will never be a Liberal. His work on the Warren Commission and his fierce attacks on Anita Hill during the Thomas Hearings have earned him an eternal dislike from the American Left But as Specter moves into the pages of American history, we can honor his actions in preserving the country that we all love so dearly. Let us agree, however, with him that his epitaph that can read "That he preserved the Constitution, and the power of the people, when both faced dire peril." The passage of these three pieces of legislation will go far to do this. Specter will have changed the course of American history by removing the mantle of unchecked dictator from the President’s shoulders – the place where George W Bush had so laughingly stated he wanted it to be.