Inspired by the administration's brilliant "Unitary Executive" legal strategy, the Republican congress needs to take a serious look at my `Mind Your Own F---ing Business Legislative theory. MYOFBL legal theory states that because Article I of the US Constitution gives ALL legislative power to the Legislative Branch, any law seeking to diminish or alter this legislative process is no more constitutional than laws that diminish the powers of the Executive to act as Commander-In-Chief.
For example, suppose that a congressman wishes to make laws based upon a votes-go-to-the-highest-bidder process. Some may argue that the laws against bribery would make this illegal. However, this argument would be in error.
You see, this alleged-legislation was enacted by a previous congress and signed into law by the President. If this law were actually constitutional, then in order to remove this law, the legislature would need to go through a similar, long drawn out process; one that includes BOTH houses of congress and the Executive branch. To say that the acts of a previous Congress and any President should constrain the current Congress in its legislative process is ridiculous. After all, multiple Presidents have signed such laws as FISA and its amendments into so-called-law. Yet we don't expect the President to get a congressional OK to ignore laws that interfere with his job do we? We recognize that these laws are really just guidelines.
The Constitution is hardly quiet on the issue. Clearly stated in Article I, Section 5; "Each House may determine the Rules of its Proceedings, punish its Members for disorderly Behavior, and, with the Concurrenceof two-thirds, expel a Member." Clearly, this section should be read such that the decision as to whether a `no bribes' rule should be enforced is under the purview of each house of congress and should be decided and redecided by each branch of congress alone. To do otherwise would subject them to harrasment via investigation and arrest from the Executive branch and judgement from the Judicial branch, which clearly violates the principle of separation of powers.
Fear not however; for Congress is not above the law. Acts such as murder, theft, extortion etc, would all still be illegal except in the narrow cases where the congress decided that the alleged crimes were committed as part of the legislative process, in which case, a fellow congressman could always file an ethics complaint.