Choosing the less unconstitutional course
Obama should override the debt ceiling
By Neil H. Buchanan and Michael C. Dorf, Special to CNN
January 11, 2013
Editor's note: Neil H. Buchanan is an economist and professor of law at George Washington University Law School. Michael C. Dorf, a former law clerk for U.S. Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy, is the Robert S. Stevens Professor of Law at Cornell University Law School. Their article on the president's options in the face of the debt ceiling impasse appeared in the October 2012 issue of the Columbia Law Review, with a recent follow-up appearing in the online edition of the same journal.
(CNN) -- President Barack Obama might soon find himself in a quandary in which basic arithmetic prevents him from faithfully executing all of the laws Congress has passed. The debt ceiling statute prohibits borrowing enough money to make up the difference between funds in the Treasury and legal obligations to spend.
Anything the president does would violate some law. Indeed, anything he does would be unconstitutional because all of the relevant powers -- spending, taxing and borrowing -- belong to Congress.
Many Washington insiders have assumed that if Congress fails to raise the debt ceiling, Obama could simply cut spending. But constitutional history says otherwise.
(More here.)
By Neil H. Buchanan and Michael C. Dorf, Special to CNN
January 11, 2013
Editor's note: Neil H. Buchanan is an economist and professor of law at George Washington University Law School. Michael C. Dorf, a former law clerk for U.S. Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy, is the Robert S. Stevens Professor of Law at Cornell University Law School. Their article on the president's options in the face of the debt ceiling impasse appeared in the October 2012 issue of the Columbia Law Review, with a recent follow-up appearing in the online edition of the same journal.
(CNN) -- President Barack Obama might soon find himself in a quandary in which basic arithmetic prevents him from faithfully executing all of the laws Congress has passed. The debt ceiling statute prohibits borrowing enough money to make up the difference between funds in the Treasury and legal obligations to spend.
Anything the president does would violate some law. Indeed, anything he does would be unconstitutional because all of the relevant powers -- spending, taxing and borrowing -- belong to Congress.
Many Washington insiders have assumed that if Congress fails to raise the debt ceiling, Obama could simply cut spending. But constitutional history says otherwise.
(More here.)
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