Civics Review

     A comment yesterday -- unpublished so I can address it here on the "front page" -- argued that the President is being frustrated by the courts in the faithful execution of his job:

     "...[T]he Executive can no longer fulfill Constitutional duties because Judicial Branch, particularly district courts, keep blocking his attempts.

     "The President is to faithfully execute the law as defined by the Legislative Branch, but it seems that the Judiciary and Democrats disagree."

     It's an interesting take, and I'll bet if you tuned the radio/TV dial and trawled the Web down the right-hand side of the Ad Fontes Media Bias Chart, you'd find it repeated -- but it's got some problems.

     First and foremost, the three branches of the Federal government are supposed to get in each other's way.  It's that "checks and balances" thing you might remember from high school Civics or American Government class.  I hope you remember it -- an awful lot of talking heads in the media ignore it when they don't get the outcome they prefer.  If a law (or other Federal action) gets jammed up with any one branch, it can be stymied.  It might not be; but the Framers, well aware of how badly a powerful government can mess people up, were not at all shy about designing a system that offered many opportunities to reconsider.

     Second, "law as defined by the Legislative Branch" is one thing -- and Executive Orders are quite another.  And that other thing is not being laws.  Point to any specific Federal laws the current President is enforcing: nearly all of his high-profile moves have been based on his own Executive Orders instead.  The 119th Congress has been historically passive, enacting four (4) laws so far -- and that includes the one they had to pass to keep Federal paychecks from bouncing.

     Third, while Congress writes the laws -- and, ideally, writes them so clearly their meaning is unmistakable,* when issues of interpretation arise, it's up to the Judicial Branch to try to dope out what Congress meant: the courts define the law, not Congress.†

     Fourth, "it seems that the Judiciary and Democrats disagree," pretty much defines both why we have three branches of our Federal government and the role of opposition parties: they're there to disagree.  If the point intends to take aim at Federal judges appointed by Democratic Presidents, I have bad news for you: a significant number of the judges standing up to potentially unlawful or unconstitutional actions by the Trump administration were appointed by Republican Presidents -- including Mr. Trump himself.  The law is the law, the facts are the facts, and judges are reasonably expected to take a logical, dispassionate look at them.  Will they nevertheless tend to worry more about people caught up in the gears, or about the orderly workings of enforcement, or any number of other angles?  Probably; they're human beings.  But we expect them to make a solid try at getting it right.  And if their decision is the Executive didn't play by the rules, well, there you go.

     Look, there's a name for a system of government in which the guy in charge makes his own laws, sends armed minions to enforce them and expects the courts to condone his and their actions while nobody dares say boo, but it's not a democracy or a republic.  It's an old, old system, one the Ancient Greeks kept falling into and Rome threw over until it crept back nearly five centuries later.  It's a system Europe suffered under for centuries, and one that oppressed the American colonies until we stood up and kicked the King's men out.  Why are you so hot to bring it back?
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* Ha!  If there's one thing every Senator and Member of the House is good at, it's obfuscation.  When they send vacation postcards, you can't even figure out where they went.  Then there's the little matter of lobbyists handing out suggested draft legislation, like high school students with bootleg Cliff Notes....
 
† This is an oversimplification.  In practice, Congress often sets goals for the various Departments, Commissions, Bureaus and Agencies, and they in turn proceed to write regulations.  In the past, the courts have generally given considerable deference to what those entities have written and promulgated, but this arrangement is under increasing challenge.  Broadly, the courts decide -- and they may find themselves doing a lot more deciding in the future.