The Left Doesn’t Believe in the Constitutional Order

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9 months ago

David Harsanyi @davidharsanyi

David Harsanyi is a senior writer at the Washington Examiner and a nationally syndicated columnist. He is cohost of the “You’re Wrong” podcast and author of multiple books. Subscribe his Substack.

During oral arguments in Trump v. Slaughter, Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor threatened America with a good time, warning that the administration is “asking us to destroy the structure of government.”

Great. It’s about time an unaccountable fourth branch of the state was decimated. Trump v. Slaughter revolves around the president’s ability to fire executive branch officials without cause at “independent” agencies. For one thing, nowhere does the Constitution empower Congress to create “independent” anything. The notion is a concoction of our worst former president, Woodrow Wilson, and it was codified nearly a century ago in Humphrey’s Executor v. United States, when the court ruled that the Federal Trade Commission was a quasilegislative, executive and judicial agency.

Google AI still informs me that the Federal Trade Commission is an “independent agency” that is “technically within the executive branch structure,” which is not a real thing. Moreover, even if it were one, the scope of “independent” agencies has expanded significantly since 1934. In some ways, they now have more power over Americans than any branch. There is no conception of the founding that included a sprawling autonomous administrative state empowered to create its own rules, investigate citizens, adjudicate guilt, impose fines and destroy lives. The Supreme Court already overturned the Chevron deference, which granted agencies nearly unfettered powers to create regulatory regimes without Congress. Humphrey’s Executor deserves the same fate.

But we should not ignore the political aspect of the debate over “independent” agencies: the Left’s bad-faith warnings about the collapse of the constitutional order.

Legacy media outlets warn that the Supreme Court is “poised to expand presidential powers” or “vastly expand presidential powers.” Modern presidents have taken far too much power, no doubt. Often, that power is unconstitutionally handed to the executive by Congress, as in the case of levying tariffs. Article II of the Constitution, however, unsurprisingly vests control of the executive branch in the executive. So what power is being expanded here? One that explicitly exists? Or rather, as professor Randy Barnett asks:

full story at https://www.dailysignal.com/2025/12/13/left-doesnt-believe-constitutional-order/