Samantha Graves-Brownell’s Post

Elevator Pitch. On January 8, 1790, President George Washington FIRST established the practice of reporting to the U.S. Congress once a year. Article II, Section 3, Clause 1 of the U.S. Constitution requires that the President ". . . shall from time to time give to the Congress Information of the State of the Union, and recommend to their Consideration such Measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient." President Washington gave Congress his FIRST annual message — now known as the "State of the Union" — on January 8, 1790. He addressed Congress in person in the U.S. Senate Chamber of Federal Hall in New York City, New York (the temporary seat of our government at that time). The second President, John Adams, also conveyed his annual messages in person. Adams' successor, Thomas Jefferson, ended the practice. President Jefferson sent his messages to Congress in writing. For his FIRST annual message, Jefferson had his private secretary deliver copies to the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate to be read by clerks. In an attached letter, Jefferson states that appearing in person is too time-consuming, and he wants to give Congress "relief from the embarrassment of immediate answers on subjects not yet fully before them." Jefferson's written communication with Congress began a tradition that lasted over a hundred years. The 28th President, Woodrow Wilson, broke custom by personally addressing a joint session of the 63rd Congress on December 2, 1913, in the form of a speech. With few exceptions, all subsequent Presidents have made it a tradition to deliver an annual message before a joint session of Congress. For example, President John F. Kennedy practiced his prepared remarks in a U.S. Capitol elevator pre-State of the Union on January 11, 1962. This message, which serves as an opportunity for the President to address the Nation and the Congress on the state of the country and their policy agenda, has become known as the "State of the Union" address. The term "State of the Union" was FIRST coined during the presidency of Franklin D. Roosevelt and became a common phrase in American political discourse during Harry Truman's administration. The "State of the Union" address has become a crucial event on the political calendar, allowing the President to outline their vision for the coming year and for the American people to hear directly from their elected leader. #Constitution #ConstitutionalLaw #Politics 

Impressive. If you were fortunate enough to have heard the audio stream of today’s US Supreme Court, aka SCOTUS, you may have been even shocked at the intelligence, scholarship, and lack of any obvious political agenda of all of the justices. While the 14th amendment is critical to the progressive agenda, providing a partial explanation for the very evenhanded questioning of the Colorado contingent, it was truly a day to celebrate. Regardless of the outcome of this Supreme Court session and it’s ruling on the eligibility of a presidential candidate, if one were to note the “party” of each president who appointed each Justice, it was nearly indistinguishable in the line of questioning. It was a day about law and logic, not politics, thankfully. A ray of hope — in an insane world on fire? 1. Chief Justice John Roberts - Appointed by President George W. Bush in 2005. 2. Justice Clarence Thomas - Appointed by President George H.W. Bush in 1991. 3. Ketanji Brown Jackson - appointed by President Joe Biden in 2022. 4. Justice Samuel Alito - Appointed by President George W. Bush in 2006. 5. Justice Sonia Sotomayor - Appointed by President Barack Obama in 2009. 6. Justice Elena Kagan - Appointed by President Barack Obama in 2010. 7. Justice Neil Gorsuch - Appointed by President Donald Trump in 2017. 8. Justice Brett Kavanaugh - Appointed by President Donald Trump in 2018. 9. Justice Amy Coney Barrett - Appointed by President Donald Trump in 2020.

SCOTUS Majority in Dobbs v. Jackson: "If it is not necessary to decide more to dispose of a case, then it is necessary not to decide more." SCOTUS Majority in Trump v. Anderson: In front of us is a single question: Did the Colorado Supreme Court err in ordering President Trump excluded from the 2024 presidential primary ballot? Oh, well, we can answer a whole bunch of other questions, too. SCOTUS Majority in Dobbs v. Jackson: "We do not pretend to know how our political system or society will respond to today’s decision overruling Roe and Casey. And even if we could foresee what will happen, we would have no authority to let that knowledge influence our decision." SCOTUS Majority in Trump v. Anderson (pages 11-12) : We know how our political system would respond to today's decision and, with authority, we have let that knowledge influence our decision. Not a shred of credibility left, sadly. Photo: Reima Jussila, pre Dobbs era (2022).

Here are the fundamental mistakes the Lawyers from Colorado committed before the Supreme Court and what POTUS never bothered to mention, including the weak Democratic appointees! "The single most astonishing thing about yesterday’s oral arguments before the Supreme Court was the almost complete lack of historical context in those arguments about an insurrectionist staying on the ballot. The fear that led Colorado to ban Trump from the ballot was that he’d keep his word and “suspend the Constitution” and “be a dictator on day one.” Neither were mentioned even once: the words “suspend” and “dictator” don’t appear anywhere in the transcript. And yet that is exactly what provoked Pennsylvania Congressman Thaddeus Stevens, Michigan’s Senator Jacob Howard, and New York’s Senator Roscoe Conkling (and 12 others) to write and push through Congress the 14th Amendment. The Confederate states had ceased to be a democracy in any real sense by the late 1830s, as I detail in The Hidden History of American Oligarchy, with the wealthiest families in each of those states running them like dictatorial fiefdoms. When their political or economic power was challenged, they were not at all reluctant to beat, imprison, and even lynch poor or working-class whites: much like today’s Russia, no dissent was tolerated. If somebody tried to launch a serious political challenge against one of the Old South’s oligarchs during that era, they most frequently ended up dead or being burned out of their home. That is the American Trump is promising to bring us back to “again." Daily Kos

THE UNITARY EXECUTIVE THEORY IS PLAINLY WRONG AND ANTI-AMERICAN: “PRESIDENTS ARE NOT KINGS” - PDF: https://lnkd.in/gT_7CFvg Thus, there is scant support for the entire case line recognizing the “unitary executive.” And that support depends upon a single case, Myers, which was itself decided by the vote of a former president who clearly supported additional presidential power. Dissents by the great dissenters, Justices Holmes and Brandeis, and the dissent by Justice McReynolds are simply ignored.135 As Robert Post states “[i]t is plain, therefore, that Taft did not approach the Myers case as a blank slate. He held definite and strong preconceptions about presidential removal power, which he viewed ‘through executive colored glasses.’ He would bring to Myers the entire weight of his considerable presidential experience.”136 Not a single governor had unlimited power to remove state officials at the time of the drafting of the United States Constitution. It is, in the end, ahistorical to posit the framers intended such power would be vested in the executive.137 The people, through Congress, not the president as a King surrogate, had ultimate power. President Trump clearly believes he was a king. He was not. Both the Constitution itself and Constitutional history make that abundantly clear. The kingship claim is made under the guise of the Unitary Executive Theory, a theory that lacks any historical grounding and a theory that is fundamentally at odds with why the American Revolution was fought. It is a very dangerous theory, as the Presidency under Trump illustrates. Its culmination: a physical assault on the Capital. This article will first examine the Constitutional history of the power of the president, and then turn to the rise of the doctrine of the Unitary Executive Theory. Its history from the Constitutional Convention and onwards will also be discussed, with particular attention to the impeachment of President Johnson. It will be suggested that history indicates that the framers thought the executive was subservient to Congress, which was the source of ultimate power because it embodied the will of the people. The ramers’ concept was that Congress legislated and, the president was simply charged with carrying out what Congress decreed.

I’m excited to begin Cassidy Hutchinson’s book “Enough”. While we may hold different political ideologies and have ties to opposing political parties, what connects me to wanting to hear Cassidy’s story is that she’s a catalyst for patriotism — who like former Congresswoman of Wyoming Liz Cheney ultimately chose the United States Constitution above political survival, and loyalty to one man. She chose the nation and while this doesn’t mean we agree on on best policy, it does mean that we’re faithful to the same team. November isn’t an election of Trump vs. Biden. It is an election between Trump vs the United States Constitution. I myself would have supported a Cheney ticket over a Biden ticket because while “bad government is better than no government” is a true wisdom shared by the British Thomas Hobbes, we broke up with the British in the 18th Century and guaranteed good government, absent of monarchy and foreign influence. The political conformity of being limited to “the lesser of two evils” has only accelerated the political degradation we see today. I encourage people to consume information that may not align with voices that share theirs because only consuming affirming data forbids us from truly understanding the full scope of our political experience and stops us from making better political decision-making that transforms our political future for a more perfect union. You can hate the GOP and be a Patriot or hate the Dems and be a Patriot but you can’t hate the Constitution and be a Patriot. Recommend this read as well as Federalist 9-10 “The Utility of the Union as a Safeguard Against Domestic Faction and Insurrection” written by American Founding Fathers Alexander Hamilton and James Madison.

Former President Donald Trump, who officially clinched his party’s 2024 presidential nomination today, has chosen Senator, best-selling author, and Convention of States supporter J.D. Vance as his running mate. In the past, Vance indicated his support for an Article V convention in a Convention of States candidate survey. He answered “yes” to both questions: whether he would support and vote for the Convention of States Project’s application for an Article V convention and whether he believed it was “appropriate” for state legislatures to use their authority granted in Article V of the U.S. Constitution to propose constitutional amendments through a state-led convention. “J.D. Vance is a serious dyed-in-the-wool leader who will take the needs of the American people seriously,” expressed Convention of States President Mark Meckler. “Raised in a Rust Belt town in middle America, he understands that the grassroots is more important than the political elites. Vance’s rise from poverty to Yale Law School and, subsequently, the United States Senate serves as a modern-day testament to the enduring promise of the American dream.” The best-selling author of the wildly popular memoir “Hillbilly Elegy” and a former Marine, Vance has frequently condemned the political elites who control the country. “We are ruled by unserious people who are worried about fake problems instead of the real fact that our country is falling apart in some of the most important ways,” he once stated. Read more: https://lnkd.in/ejVWvSVW #JDVance #Trump #Trumprally #RustBelt #America #usnews #news #trendingnews

In this timely episode of Hidden Forces, I speak with Henry Olsen about the unprecedented circumstances surrounding Joe Biden’s candidacy for the 2024 Democratic Presidential nomination, who is likely to replace him, and why Donald Trump is well-positioned to win in 2024. In the first hour, Henry analyzes the unprecedented circumstances surrounding Joe Biden’s recent debate performance and the pressure mounting on him to withdraw from the race, including rumors that the U.S. President may, in fact, have Parkinson’s disease or some other type of neurological disorder that disqualifies him from running in 2024. We speculate about who may be making policy decisions in the White House outside of the president himself, why so many Democrats and members of the press appeared surprised by the President’s debate performance, Biden’s potential replacement, and when (and how) his replacement will be chosen. In the second hour, Henry offers his opinion, backed by polls and decades of political experience, on what the 2024 election will ultimately be about and how this election will be remembered in American history. We discuss: 1⃣ the role immigration will play in this election 2⃣ the possibility of a U.S. withdrawal from NATO under Donald Trump 3⃣ the evolution of Trump’s foreign policy since leaving office 4⃣ the people who would staff the Trump Whitehouse and cabinet in 2024 5⃣ and why Trump’s likely choice for Vice President is so important. https://lnkd.in/e8MZszCK

https://lnkd.in/gyGH3Apv "A powerful dissection of one of the fundamental problems in American governance today: the clash between presidents determined to redirect the nation through ever-tighter control of administration and an executive branch still organized to promote shared interests in steady hands, due deliberation, and expertise. As the nation’s chief executive, Donald Trump pitted himself repeatedly against the institutions and personnel of the executive branch. In the process, two once-obscure concepts came center stage in an eerie faceoff. On one side was the specter of a “Deep State” conspiracy-administrators threatening to thwart the will of the people and undercut the constitutional authority of the president they elected to lead them. On the other side was a raw personalization of presidential power, one that a theory of “the unitary executive” gussied up and allowed to run roughshod over reason and the rule of law. The Deep State and the unitary executive framed every major contest of the Trump presidency. Like phantom twins, they drew each other out and wrestled to light basic issues of governance long suppressed. Though this conflict reached a fever pitch during the Trump presidency, it is not new. Stephen Skowronek, John A. Dearborn, and Desmond King trace the tensions between presidential power and the depth of the American state back through the decades and forward through the various settlements arrived at in previous eras. Phantoms of a Beleaguered Republic is about the breakdown of settlements and the abiding vulnerabilities of a Constitution that gave scant attention to administrative power. Rather than simply dump on Trump, the authors provide a richly historical perspective on the conflicts that rocked his presidency, and they explain why, if left untamed, the phantom twins will continue to pull the American government apart."