The Lawless Law Professor

The online edition of The Wall Street Journal reported this morning that President Obama will announce his recently promised defacto legalization program for approximately four million undocumented/illegal residents on Friday at an event in Las Vegas. This is a far cry from his 2011 statement noting that going it alone (i,e, without Congress) is "not how our democracy functions." What the president is doing, under the guise of prosecutorial  discretion, is that he is refusing to enforce the existing body of immigration law.

The issue here is not immigration reform which is something I support, but rather an unprecedented reach of executive power. Instead of being the cautious law professor he once was, I guess President Obama is channeling his inner Richard Nixon or his inner Dick Cheney. As others have noted the day will come when a future Republican president refuses to enforce environmental protection and income tax laws using the same lame excuse. Simply put if he wants to change the immigration law he needs the Congress. That is how the system works.

I close by noting that when/if fascism comes to the United States it won't come from jack-booted thugs marching in the streets , but rather it will come in on the cat feet of well intentioned liberals who have grown impatient with the more orderly processes of democracy.