Why Boehner is right to sue Obama
http://theweek.com/article/index/264014/why-boehner-is-right-to-sue-obama
Congressional incompetence or inaction is not an invitation for an imperial presidency
By Matt K. Lewis | July 1, 2014
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Obama's promise of executive action is bad news — even for supporters of immigration reform (and that includes me). Because even though I support immigration reform, I support the separation of powers even more. And this president has gone too far in flexing his executive ordering muscles.
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"On matters ranging from health care and energy to foreign policy and education, President Obama has repeatedly run an end-around on the American people and their elected legislators, straining the boundaries of the solemn oath he took on Inauguration Day," a recent memo from Boehner said.
In pushing back, Obama's supporters have pointed to intransigence from congressional Republicans forcing Obama's hand, and to the fact that the president has still issued relatively few executive orders (fewer than any president since FDR, in fact). This is true, but also misleading. It's not the number of executive orders the president issues, but how consequential — or controversial — they are. And, coupled with recess appointments (the Supreme Court just unanimously ruled he overreached there), signing statements, and unilateral delays on ObamaCare's implementation (including the employer mandate and enrollment deadlines), it seems like Obama has cobbled together a patchwork of creative methods to circumvent the legislative branch.
We have a lame-duck president who already lost one one house of Congress, and may be on the brink of losing another. If Obama is to have any second-term domestic agenda, including a legacy item like immigration reform, his only path may be via executive order. But that doesn't make it right — or constitutional.
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