Checks and Balances

December 4, 2018|Checks and Balances, Edmund Randolph, House of Representatives, James Madison, Jonah Goldberg, Niccolo Machiavelli, Senate

Real Purpose of the Senate: To Check the Actions of the House

by James Wallner|5 Comments

The Old Senate Chamber in the U.S. Capitol (image: Architect of the Capitol)

Senatorial independence is the highest value, said the Founders—more important than the particular interests of the states from which U.S. senators come.

December 3, 2018|Checks and Balances, Jonathan Adler, Orin Kerr, Trump, Trump Administration

Checks & Balances Responds

by Mike Rappaport|5 Comments

WASHINGTON, DC - DECEMBER 20: U.S. President Donald Trump celebrates Congress passing the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act on the South Lawn of the White House. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

President Trump's critics should supply a list of what they regard as his most problematic actions.

November 27, 2018|Checks and Balances, Donald Trump, Presidential Norms

A Question for Checks & Balances—Could You Make Your Case Against Trump?

by Mike Rappaport|19 Comments

NEW YORK, NY - AUGUST 15: President Donald Trump fielded questions from reporters about his comments on events in Charlottesville, Virginia. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

Checks and Balances raises important questions, but they need to identify the specific problems with Donald Trump.

January 4, 2018|Checks and Balances, European Union, Nationalism, separatism, Ulrike Guerot

EU “Closer Union” Advocates Have an Ally in the Separatist Movements

by Theodore Dalrymple|2 Comments

A minister of the Tsarist Russian regime once said that the paralytics of the government were locked in a struggle to the death with the paralytics of the revolution. The struggle, as we know, did not end well.

October 5, 2015|Checks and Balances, Congress, James Madison, John Boehner, Separation of Powers

Seeking a Power Agenda

by Greg Weiner|12 Comments

Conventional wisdom holds that the Speakership of the House is an impossible job because the Republican caucus is ungovernable. On this narrative, compromise is profane, and conservative purists outflank any constructive proposal leadership makes, thus rendering it toxic to the opposition. The purists are the proverbial bidders in Burke’s “auction of popularity”: “If any [leader] should happen to propose a scheme of liberty, soberly limited, and defined with proper qualifications, he will be immediately outbid by his competitors, who will produce something more splendidly popular.”

Alas: What’s a speaker to do?