A Constitutional Crisis

 

According to the President and CEO of the National Constitution Center, Jeffrey Rosen, a constitutional crisis occurs “if a president refuses to carry out an authoritative opinion of the Supreme Court.” Adam Liptak provides a more expansive view, defining a constitutional crisis as “generally the product of presidential defiance of laws and judicial rulings. It is not binary: It is a slope, not a switch. It can be cumulative, and once one starts, it can get much worse.” (New York Times, 2-12-2025).

Consider Trump’s response to federal judge James Boasberg who temporarily blocked the removal by the Trump administration of Venezuelan migrants under the Alien and Sedition Act of 1798, which his administration is stonewalling. In Trump’s eloquent phrasing, the judge is a “Radical Left Lunatic” who should be impeached (Huffington Post, 5-20, 2025). This evoked a response from Chief Justice John Roberts that “for more than two centuries, it has been established that impeachment is not an appropriate response to disagreement concerning a judicial decision.” 

The deeper problem is that Trump dismisses the significance of the constitutional checks and balances built into the operating relationship between the three branches of government. He contends, in effect, that the sole power to govern resides in the executive branch, based, typically, on some fabricated emergency, in which, according to his own, sloganeering, “Trump was [and is] right about everything.”  In the process, he is violating the foundational ethos of the constitution which is rooted in the civic values that the framers built into this nation’s founding documents, which are based on an interacting distribution of power between the three branches of government and other critical sectors, including the fourth estate, that is, the press.

 In our current situation, the critical question remains whether events surrounding the Trump administration, in their totality, represent a constitutional crisis based on the broader definition of what this means. Drawing on Liptak’s definition, it would incorporate any severe threat to the nation stimulated or directed by the usurpation of power by the president that remains largely unchecked by other sources of constitutional legitimacy. Trump’s assertion that “he who saves his Country does not violate any Law,” is precisely that which the founders rejected, which when acted upon with serious intent, represents a threat of major proportions.

 The problem is “we the people” elected Donald J. Trump as president in 2024 even though he is a convicted felon and sought to overturn the 2020 election through a combination of legal and, reasonably argued, illegal means that resulted in a federal and state indictment that by all rights should have gone to trial.  A thread of illegality, dubious constitutional practices, and demagogic conspiracy mongering has underpinned Trump’s views since he entered national politics.  In 2024, a declared law breaker, has become the nation’s chief law enforcer. This did not necessarily need to lead to a constitutional crisis, but, Trump, acting out of his more pernicious impulses—seeking to govern through dominance and political intimidation—has evoked a variety of constitutional crises in his daily operation of the presidency, as many astute commentators have pointed out.

 The tragedy is that if Trump truly sought the greatness he claims to already possess, he could draw on the profusion of resources that are abundantly available throughout this country. This would require honoring past and current achievements of others in taking on the hard work needed to make the United States a first-rate nation. This would include diligently seeking to create greater abundance and justice for all, as well as the development of a first-rate workforce and educational system. It would also include constructively working with other nations and alliances in gaining the true stature of recognition as the preeminent global leader of the world. The cost of attaining such greatness would require an abandonment of the president’s polarized world view, in which anything that does not fit into his stultifying concept of what comprises the national interest needs to be eradicated from the public arena. Without such a shift in mindset in his perpetual hunting out of enemies, the conflicts that follow him in whatever he does can only continue to haunt him, as well as us. This is so because, in the final analysis, his vision for the nation, the world, and his own self-image is much too small, and frankly mean spirited to meet the myriads of challenges the role bestowed upon him requires.

 The fact that this person is the President of the United States, is itself a constitutional crisis. It is one that “we the people” have brought upon ourselves and will require a “we the people” resolution if we are ever to get beyond the conundrum that is the result of our own doing.

 


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