Immigration, the latest legislative farce

**Posted by Phineas

I’ve been taking a break, catching up on my reading, and a recent column byΒ Andrew McCarthyΒ reminded me of the disgust I felt at the shameful process by which Obamacare was passed, a feeling I’m experiencing again as the Senate moves closer to the passage of the 1,000+ pages-long immigration bill. So, I thought I’d share an excerpt from it that sums up my feelings quite nicely:

But there is a larger point: no β€œimportant legislation” should be 100 pages long, much less 1,200 (or the even more mind-boggling girth of monstrosities like Obamacare). The United States Constitution is about 4,500 words long β€” outfits like Cato and Heritage publish it in small pamphlets that can be read in a few minutes. Nowadays, not only are the bills so gargantuan that no one could conceivably master them and predict their consequences; each page produces even more pages of regulations. They can’t even be lifted, much less digested.

You cannot have a functioning democratic republic when the laws are so voluminous no one can know what the law is.Β And that is especially the case when (a) the rationale for passing new laws β€” according to β€œreform” proponents like Senator Marco Rubio and Rep. Paul Ryan β€” is that we don’t enforce the laws currently on the books; (b) key parts of legislation consist of commitments to do what previously enacted law already commands; and (c) the president, notwithstanding his oath to take care that the laws are faithfully executed, claims the power to refrain from enforcing whatever laws he disapproves of.Β Washington has made a farce of the legislative process and of the once proud boast that we are ”a nation of laws not men.”

Yep. My only quibble would be to add “Once again,…” to the start of the last sentence.

Then again, what’s the point of making it even just one page, when many don’t feel a needΒ to even read the billsΒ they’re voting on?

Shameful and disgraceful.

(Crossposted at Public Secrets)

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