Sunday, January 10, 2010
Like those who served before him in the Oval Office, President Barack Obama intends to disregard certain parts of new laws adopted by Congress—only in a quieter and less transparent manner. In the first half of 2009, Obama issued several “signing statements” while approving legislation, including one in late June that provoked backlash from both Democratic and Republican lawmakers. Since then, the White House has decided to follow a different path that still asserts the president’s authority to bypass new laws.
Instead of issuing a signing statement for a bill that forbade State Department officials from attending United Nations meetings led by nations deemed state sponsors of terrorism, Obama went to the Department of Justice’s Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) to obtain an opinion pronouncing the law unconstitutional. Jack Goldsmith, who ran the OLC under President George W. Bush, told The New York Times that this new approach was more secretive, since OLC opinions don’t tend to be published. (Under Goldsmith’s watch, the OLC was responsible for issuing the secret legal opinions that authorized the Bush administration to use torture against suspected terrorists.)
In addition to using OLC opinions, the Obama White House is relying on “statements of administration policy” to warn Congress about provisions that raise constitutional concerns. Legal scholars have said the administration’s new approach could avoid public fights with Congress, but at the expense of observers being able to keep track of how many bills Obama signs “with conditions.”
-Noel Brinkerhoff
Obama Takes New Route to Opposing Parts of Laws (by Charlie Savage, New York Times)
Both Parties in House Slam Obama Signing Statement (by David Wallechinsky and Noel Brinkerhoff, AllGov)
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