Obama Twist the Constitution
The question of an end run around the Constitution by using the 14th Amendment to increase the debt ceiling has come into play. At a town hall meeting in South Carolina District 1 Congressman Tim Scott was ask about that possibility. “This president is looking to usurp congressional oversight to find a way to get it done without us. My position is that is an impeachable act from my perspective. There are a lot of things people say, ‘Are you going to impeach the president over that?’ — No. But this? This is catastrophic. This jeopardizes the credibility of our nation if one man can usurp the entire system set up by our founding fathers over something this significant,” Rep. Tim Scott (R-SC) said.
Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) and Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) dismissed this solution. However, Obama sidestepped the question at a White House Twitter town hall saying “I don’t think we should even get to the constitutional issue.”
Even though Scott had referred to the idea as “silly” he did go on to say that “there is a tad bit of truth to it.” Obama may be looking at section 4,
“The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither the United States nor any State shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave; but all such debts, obligations and claims shall be held illegal and void.”
But is the President missing the next part of the amendment?
“Section 5.
The Congress shall have the power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.”
The whole debate is over “The Congress” passing “appropriate legislation.” It has been about 800 days since the democrats tried to do anything with a budget. The House GOP has at least sent a framework to the Senate.
With the democrats in the Senate refusing to offer anything, it is hard to say that they want to be serious about this. The closest they are able to get to a budget is a Continuing Resolution to provide temporary funding of the government.
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