Thread by @msbellows

Let's talk about Congress's right to push back against executive overreach using its own powers instead of resorting to the courts. James Madison, Federalist 51, argued that each branch should be able to defend its own rights without having to ask for help from the others.
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Madison: "[T]he members of each department should be as little dependent as possible on those of the others..."
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"[T]he great security against a gradual concentration of the several powers in the same department, consists in giving to those who administer each department the necessary constitutional means and personal motives to resist encroachments of the others...
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”[T]he constant aim is to divide and arrange the several offices in such a manner as that each may be a check on the other...
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”... But it is not possible to give to each department an equal power of self-defense. In republican government, the legislative authority necessarily predominates."

Again, that's James Madison. is.gd/oazsuJ
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And the courts themselves affirm that when the political branches disagree, courts should be the LAST resort, not the first...
See, eg, U.S. v. House, 556 F.Supp.150 (DDC 1983): ... law.justia.com/cases/federal/…

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"When constitutional disputes arise concerning the respective powers of the Legislative and Executive Branches, judicial intervention should be delayed until all possibilities for settlement have been exhausted."
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Look, I'm a lawyer, mediator, and arbitrator. I BELIEVE in courts. But I also believe in the Constitution, which creates and circumscribes those courts. And that Constitution gives each branch the power to "defend" itself against the others, BY itself.
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That Constitution INTENTIONALLY erects a system where "jealousy" and "rivalry" leads the branches to sometimes slug it out between themselves. Sure, turn to courts when appropriate.
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But if the president refuses to cooperate w/ Congress AT ALL? The Framers would have been the first to approve of Congress responding by cutting off funding to executive departments + presidentally-preferred projects, overriding presidential vetoes, or invoking impeachment.
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I mean, that's the damn DESIGN, people. And @JonathanTurley, and all but one or two of the dumbest HJC members, know that. They do. They know better. They're just lying when they pretend otherwise. A pox upon each one of them.
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