Skip to main content
Menu

Main navigation

  • About
    • Annual Reports
    • Leadership
    • Jobs
    • Student Programs
    • Media Information
    • Store
    • Contact
    LOADING...
  • Experts
    • Policy Scholars
    • Adjunct Scholars
    • Fellows
  • Events
    • Upcoming
    • Past
    • Event FAQs
    • Sphere Summit
    LOADING...
  • Publications
    • Studies
    • Commentary
    • Books
    • Reviews and Journals
    • Public Filings
    LOADING...
  • Blog
  • Donate
    • Sponsorship Benefits
    • Ways to Give
    • Planned Giving
    • Meet the Development Team

Issues

  • Constitution and Law
    • Constitutional Law
    • Criminal Justice
    • Free Speech and Civil Liberties
  • Economics
    • Banking and Finance
    • Monetary Policy
    • Regulation
    • Tax and Budget Policy
  • Politics and Society
    • Education
    • Government and Politics
    • Health Care
    • Poverty and Social Welfare
    • Technology and Privacy
  • International
    • Defense and Foreign Policy
    • Global Freedom
    • Immigration
    • Trade Policy
Live Now

Cato at Liberty


  • Blog Home
  • RSS

Email Signup

Sign up to have blog posts delivered straight to your inbox!

Topics
  • Banking and Finance
  • Constitutional Law
  • Criminal Justice
  • Defense and Foreign Policy
  • Education
  • Free Speech and Civil Liberties
  • Global Freedom
  • Government and Politics
  • Health Care
  • Immigration
  • Monetary Policy
  • Poverty and Social Welfare
  • Regulation
  • Tax and Budget Policy
  • Technology and Privacy
  • Trade Policy
Archives
  • April 2021
  • March 2021
  • February 2021
  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • November 2020
  • October 2020
  • September 2020
  • August 2020
  • July 2020
  • June 2020
  • May 2020
  • April 2020
  • March 2020
  • February 2020
  • January 2020
  • December 2019
  • November 2019
  • October 2019
  • September 2019
  • August 2019
  • July 2019
  • June 2019
  • May 2019
  • April 2019
  • March 2019
  • February 2019
  • January 2019
  • December 2018
  • November 2018
  • October 2018
  • September 2018
  • August 2018
  • July 2018
  • June 2018
  • May 2018
  • April 2018
  • March 2018
  • February 2018
  • January 2018
  • December 2017
  • November 2017
  • October 2017
  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • April 2017
  • March 2017
  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • December 2016
  • November 2016
  • October 2016
  • September 2016
  • August 2016
  • July 2016
  • June 2016
  • May 2016
  • April 2016
  • March 2016
  • February 2016
  • January 2016
  • December 2015
  • November 2015
  • October 2015
  • September 2015
  • August 2015
  • July 2015
  • June 2015
  • May 2015
  • April 2015
  • March 2015
  • February 2015
  • January 2015
  • December 2014
  • November 2014
  • October 2014
  • September 2014
  • August 2014
  • July 2014
  • June 2014
  • May 2014
  • April 2014
  • March 2014
  • February 2014
  • January 2014
  • December 2013
  • November 2013
  • October 2013
  • September 2013
  • August 2013
  • July 2013
  • June 2013
  • May 2013
  • April 2013
  • March 2013
  • February 2013
  • January 2013
  • December 2012
  • November 2012
  • October 2012
  • September 2012
  • August 2012
  • July 2012
  • June 2012
  • May 2012
  • April 2012
  • March 2012
  • February 2012
  • January 2012
  • December 2011
  • November 2011
  • October 2011
  • September 2011
  • August 2011
  • July 2011
  • June 2011
  • May 2011
  • April 2011
  • March 2011
  • February 2011
  • January 2011
  • December 2010
  • November 2010
  • October 2010
  • September 2010
  • August 2010
  • July 2010
  • June 2010
  • May 2010
  • April 2010
  • March 2010
  • February 2010
  • January 2010
  • December 2009
  • November 2009
  • October 2009
  • September 2009
  • August 2009
  • July 2009
  • June 2009
  • May 2009
  • April 2009
  • March 2009
  • February 2009
  • January 2009
  • December 2008
  • November 2008
  • October 2008
  • September 2008
  • August 2008
  • July 2008
  • June 2008
  • May 2008
  • April 2008
  • March 2008
  • February 2008
  • January 2008
  • December 2007
  • November 2007
  • October 2007
  • September 2007
  • August 2007
  • July 2007
  • June 2007
  • May 2007
  • April 2007
  • March 2007
  • February 2007
  • January 2007
  • December 2006
  • November 2006
  • October 2006
  • September 2006
  • August 2006
  • July 2006
  • June 2006
  • May 2006
  • April 2006
  • Show More
October 20, 2016 3:02PM

Sen. Mike Lee on Executive Power & Conscientious Electors

By Caleb O. Brown

SHARE

This weekend, I sat down with Senator Mike Lee (R-UT) for the Cato Daily Podcast. We discussed executive power, criminal justice reform, the Electoral College and this strange, disappointing election year. Here's a portion of our discussion:

Caleb Brown: President Obama has said he's concerned, and I have a bit of a hard time taking some of what he says seriously, he's concerned about leaving a loaded gun around in the White House for the next President, which is, it's almost comical.

Senator Mike Lee: That's wonderful. If that is a deathbed repentance, it's better than no repentance at all. I would like to see what he means by that. I hope he means the same thing that you or I would mean if we made that kind of a statement, which people like you and I do, say things like that all the time. Look, this President has, in fact, taken a lot of steps in the direction of consolidating power in the Executive Branch. And this has been one of the consistent refrains that you've heard from some members of Congress. One of the consistent themes that I've tried to follow, is pointing out to Republicans and Democrats alike, in both Houses of Congress, look, regardless of how you feel about this President's policy, regardless of how you feel about this President's political orientation, this is a bad practice. This is something that ought to scare the daylights out of any Republican or any Democrat or Libertarian or person of any other political stripe, because this is not American. This is not how we do things.

We don't live in a kind of government where Presidents can appropriately say if Congress won't act, I will. That's kind of scary. Scary because of what it says about the consolidation of power in the minds of the chief executive, in the minds of the American public as far as they regard the executive, it's also scary for the simple reason that in many respects the law allows them to do precisely that. Because we've got so much buildup from so many decades of broad, amorphous, quasi lawmaking, where we basically say we shall have good law in area X, and we hereby delegate to department or agency Y the power to make good law in area X. Well guess who controls department Y? The President, and those he chooses, who normally serve at the pleasure of the President. So, in many respects, Congress has enabled this. Congress has created this monster. And it's time for Congress to tame the monster once again.

Brown: Is there any appetite to do that this year?

Lee: There is a strong appetite on the part of some members of Congress to do that. I don't, frankly, sense a lot of appetite from the White House. In fact, aside from this statement which was made very recently and has yet to be followed up by anything substantive that I'm aware of, you don't ever hear that from the White House. And shockingly, you don't hear it very much from very many members of Congress. That is starting to change, and I'm going my best to change that, but most members of Congress have become strangely, bizarrely content with allowing for this delegated lawmaking trend to continue. And in fact I wrote a book called Our Lost Constitution, it just came out in paperback, and in Our Lost Constitution I explain that even though our Founding Fathers thought that each branch of government would have a strong, compelling interest to guard jealously its own power, what we see is that in the last few decades the opposite has been true for Congress. Congress has been eager to delegate more and more.

Why? Well, as I explain in Our Lost Constitution, I think it has a lot to do with the fact that the Holy Grail for most politicians, most members of Congress in particular, is to avoid criticism, avoid negative publicity, and take credit for doing good things, avoid credit for doing hard things. And so when we attack a law by saying we shall have good law in area X and let's delegate the task of deciding what that means to commission Y or agency or department Y, we take credit for what's good and we avoid criticism for what's hard. That's wrong and we've got to turn that around.

On the Electoral College ...

Brown: Do you believe that presidential electors in the Electoral College are bound by anything except their own conscience?

Lee: No. There are some states that have these faithless elector laws. The constitutionality of them has been called into question and the constitutionality of them has not really been upheld or challenged or tested in court. Basically, electors have some discretion. Now, I think they are honor bound to do what's right. I don't think they ought to depart from what they are expected to do for light and transient reasons, but I think one of the reasons why our Founding Fathers put in place the Electoral College was to put an additional layer of protection there in case something really bad was going to happen. That's how I read it.

Listen to or subscribe to the Cato Daily Podcast.

Stay Connected to Cato

Sign up for the newsletter to receive periodic updates on Cato research, events, and publications.

View All Newsletters

1000 Massachusetts Ave. NW
Washington, DC 20001-5403
202-842-0200
Contact Us
Privacy

Footer 1

  • About
    • Annual Reports
    • Leadership
    • Jobs
    • Student Programs
    • Media Information
    • Store
    • Contact
  • Podcasts

Footer 2

  • Experts
    • Policy Scholars
    • Adjunct Scholars
    • Fellows
  • Events
    • Upcoming
    • Past
    • Event FAQs
    • Sphere Summit

Footer 3

  • Publications
    • Books
    • Cato Journal
    • Regulation
    • Cato Policy Report
    • Cato Supreme Court Review
    • Cato’s Letter
    • Human Freedom Index
    • Economic Freedom of the World
    • Cato Handbook for Policymakers

Footer 4

  • Blog
  • Donate
    • Sponsorship Benefits
    • Ways to Give
    • Planned Giving
Also from Cato Institute:
Libertarianism.org
|
Humanprogress.org
|
Downsizinggovernment.org