Ed Brayton is a freelance writer and speaker. He is the co-founder and president of 
Reuters reports:
During a fund-raiser in Denver, Obama -- a former constitutional law professor at the University of Chicago Law School -- was asked what he hoped to accomplish during his first 100 days in office."I would call my attorney general in and review every single executive order issued by George Bush and overturn those laws or executive decisions that I feel violate the constitution," said Obama.
It would be rather refreshing to have someone in the oval office who'd actually taught constitutional law rather than someone who couldn't find the 4th amendment with both hands and a map.
Comments
It's strange. I knew Obama was a civil rights lawyer. I knew he was editor of the Harvard Law Review. I know that Bush has violated the constitution time and again. I never put that all together until this post reminded me, "That sounds like something I really want Obama to do."
Hell, he ought to be elected on that comment alone. But we live in an insane country.
Posted by: FishyFred | June 1, 2008 9:23 AM
Hmmmm... upon further thought, I have decided that this sounds like a calculated response based on who asked the question. The reason I never figured out that I wanted him to do this is that I never thought any presidential candidate would ever spend time on that.
Posted by: FishyFred | June 1, 2008 9:26 AM
It certainly does sound encouraging.
Posted by: BaldApe | June 1, 2008 9:29 AM
Some months ago, I decided that I would vote for the first presidential candidate who used the word "constitution". I then fervently hoped that it was not McCain.
Well, it looks like Obama is my man.
Posted by: Daniel Kim | June 1, 2008 9:36 AM
I am living in hope that this sort of change will happen to the land I was born and raised in. Australia has been my home for a number of years no, which by no means alters that fact I remain American, but here a recent change in government seems to have been the right thing. That Bush was first elected was a crime, and it was even sadder that he managed to get reelected. (And my hopes to move my family to the states for a few years remains on hold due to what he has done to the economy etc etc.)
Posted by: marc buhler | June 1, 2008 9:47 AM
Except, of course, that it's not the President's job to judge constitutionality of a law except through 1 thing: the Veto pen. He has no other recourse.
Now, Obama can look and and rescind existing executive orders, and he can certainly make statements that undo signing statements and direct his departments to enforce the laws as written, but any other action against existing law, other than to propose to congress to retract or file lawsuits to get the courts to look at them, is itself unconstitutional.
Should he judge a law unconstitutional and hold his departments to not enforce it, it makes him no better than Bush and his tradition of signing statements.
Posted by: Joe Shelby | June 1, 2008 9:55 AM
Bill Clinton also taught constitutional law.
Posted by: steven | June 1, 2008 10:11 AM
Big discussion on this over at Diby's blog. I consider all of this useless posturing until someone mentions "war crimes" and "tribunals" for our current administration.
Posted by: Phaedrus | June 1, 2008 10:51 AM
I'm sorry Joe, but you are either an idiot or an ass.
He very clearly is talking about "every single executive order issued by George Bush." The next president can (and certainly should) reverse as many of those as needed.
Yes he also mentions laws, and says he will work to "overturn" those he deems unconstitutional. Nothing in his comments indicates that he thinks or even implies that he can just will away laws by fiat. And he absolutely does not even mention the possibility of simply (and illegally) ignoring laws that are on the books, or directing his departments to ignore them.
Posted by: Kevin | June 1, 2008 11:26 AM
The review and reversal of presidential orders has long been a tradition following the election of the opposing party. In 2001 Bush & co. spent a lot of time trying to rid the executive branch of all things Clinton. Then replacing the Clinton smell with their own stench. Sort of like a new top dog marking territory.
And I think that Pres. Obama's first executive order would be to have Air Force 1 do a 180 on its flight to TX, taking George and Dick to the Slobo Milosevic Memorial Jail cell in The Hague.
Posted by: natural cynic | June 1, 2008 12:29 PM
Kevin, I am not an ass nor an idiot, I merely was commenting based on the surface reading of what was presented in the write-up. Had I read the actual answer as a whole (not provided in the article), I could see that he knew he had to treat laws differently and intended to do so.
The surface reading from the article as written implies that he would look at the constitutionality of existing laws and "overturn them" but its not his job to overturn them except through Congress passing a retraction or by filing lawsuits through the DOJ so the Courts can address them and that is what I was commenting on.
Posted by: Joe Shelby | June 1, 2008 1:24 PM
George W. Bush is our first MBA president, and he ran the country like a business... into the ground.
What's to prevent Obama's strength from becoming his biggest weakness.
Obama will fail because George W. Bush. Period.
Posted by: Grumpy | June 1, 2008 1:28 PM
"George W. Bush is our first MBA president, and he ran the country like a business... into the ground."
He ran the country the way *he* ran his businesses, but not the way a good business is run.
Posted by: Jim Lippard | June 1, 2008 2:01 PM
Joe Shelby writes:
In this case, that's not quite correct. One of Bush's larger assaults on the Constitution was the notion of the "unitary executive," that the president and the executive branch are sometimes beyond the scope of treaty and law. The Bybee memo asserts this as one reason that Bush's torture policies were legal.
The next president would make a significant corrective to Bush's unitary executive simply by appointing an attorney general and other members of the justice department who will investigate those acts of torture as the crimes they are. The members of Bush's administration who are then indicted could assert that defense, of course. And it would be up to the courts to decide upon it. By bringing the indictments and maintaining its own contrary opinion, the next president could do quite a bit to keep this bit of Bush obscenity from passing into precedent.
Assuming, of course, that we elect a next president who does not seek the same expanded executive power that Bush sought.
Posted by: Russell | June 1, 2008 4:36 PM
The more I hear of Obama, the more I like the sound of him.
Anne G
Posted by: Anne Gilbert | June 1, 2008 4:41 PM
Heh. Heh heh.
Posted by: gwangung | June 1, 2008 5:00 PM
Heh. Heh heh.
Posted by: gwangung | June 1, 2008 5:04 PM
Russell wrote:
The "unitary executive" notion has nothing to do with the executive branch being beyond the scope of the law. The unitary executive theory has only to do with whether Congress can create quasi-executive agencies that the president does not have full control over. Bush's views on the limits of executive authority ("there are none") have nothing at all to do with the unitary executive theory, which is an entirely valid constitutional interpretation. You're applying the label to something it does not apply to.
Posted by: Ed Brayton | June 1, 2008 5:13 PM
Heh, good deal. I had picked up that idea as well from various discussions. I just did a little more research and once again my habit of reading this blog has educated me. Thanks, Ed, and Russell too !
Posted by: Chris A. | June 1, 2008 6:10 PM
I love the way he words this.
He's not saying that unconstitutional things like the Federal Reserve would be a gone pecan. He's saying that the all the unconstitutional EOs of Bush would be gone. That's pretty narrow. But it makes it sound like he would totally reverse course on unconstitutional laws. Not the case.
He could do as Ron Paul would, which would be to selectively execute constitutional laws/programs, while not executing unconstitutional laws.
I want to hear Obama say that he would do something like that.
Posted by: whyghey | June 1, 2008 9:09 PM
Were you living under a rock between the months of October-February?
Posted by: wheyghey | June 1, 2008 9:11 PM
Ed, you may be right about the traditional interpretation of the "unitary executive", but if so you ought to speak to the Bush people about it. Their use of the term extends way beyond the creation of agencies to claim that Congress can't even assert its lawmaking authority over existing agencies.
For example, Bush's signing statement concerning the Detainee Treatment Act of 2005 explicitly cites the "constitutional authority of the President to supervise the unitary executive branch" in denying that Congress has the power to outlaw the inhumane treatment of detainees. This skates perilously close to the assertion that "the executive branch [is] beyond the scope of the law."
Posted by: noncarborundum | June 1, 2008 10:01 PM
Obama and Bush both treat the Constitution as a "God Damned piece of paper." Bush with regards to the 4th amendment and Obama as regards to the 2nd and 14th amendment.
Posted by: Mike | June 2, 2008 9:31 AM
He could do as Ron Paul would, which would be to selectively execute constitutional laws/programs, while not executing unconstitutional laws.
I want to hear Obama say that he would do something like that.
And that is EXACTLY what I DON'T want to hear him say. A President's job is to execute the laws AS WRITTEN, not to selectively execute only that which he feels like doing.
To ask Obama to do that, even to the unconstitutional acts passed and signed by Bush, makes him no better than Bush and the signing statements from hell.
It is, as I said, not his job to decide the constitutionality of a law unless it is before him as an act of Congress and he has the veto pen in hand. He can propose to Congress to undo it, and there are legal mechanisms in place to get a law before the courts to examine, but arbitrarily enforcing this but not that is what made this current administration a madhouse for our Republic, so the last thing I want is for the next President to continue to assert such powers.
Now, in some cases like wiretapping programs or defense allocations and the like, the law has only given him the authority but not the requirement. There, he can be more selective to chose to execute a power or not depending on circumstances, while awaiting for a Congressional or Judicial retraction of the law. Mind you, in some cases, the Judicial retraction isn't forthcoming given the legal catch-22 that has been created by the tradition of legal standing.
But in other cases, the laws have puts limits on the powers of his departments that Bush has, through his signing statements and subsequent actions (including the executive orders mentioned above), chosen to selectively ignore by asserting powers of the Executive over Congress. In those cases, if Obama does the same, then he is no different from Bush as far as our Constitution goes.
As I wrote in my own blog, I want to know what's on the "short list" before I hold out any hope of the restoration of balance of powers.
Posted by: Joe Shelby | June 2, 2008 9:43 AM
Cheers.
Posted by: FastLane | June 2, 2008 11:13 AM
Daniel Kim:
The first people running for president to use the words "Constituion" were the people running for the Libertarian party nomination.
And no, it was never Ron Paul
Posted by: jenn | June 3, 2008 4:42 PM