Balance of Federal Powers Need a Reset

The U.S. Supreme Court has acted in a series of cases involving challenges to executive orders signed by President Donald Trump. One of the most prominent challenges was impeding the ability of the president to deport criminal illegal aliens and gang members.

Some may see this as an unacceptable intervention in the constitutional (Article II) authority of the executive branch of the government and the president to deport such criminal aliens.

Others may consider it political bias against President Trump, as the number of judicial interventions is unprecedented. No sitting president has ever had to face such vast judicial interference in the conduct of the duties he was duly elected to perform.

Some may also see this as support of criminals as the Supreme Court has done little to protect our borders or defend the American people against illegal immigrants.

The apparent anti-Trump attitude raises several questions. One: Should the executive branch follow any judge's order no matter what? Even if it patently defies reason?

Let me give an extreme example to illustrate the point: if a judge developed a mental disease that caused him or her to decide that all American citizens must stop breathing for a month.

Should we follow this order blindly simply because it is a court order? Should we wait for several hours, or probably a few days — without breathing — for the court of appeals and SCOTUS to rule on such a bizarre court order? Or should we ignore it completely because it defies all logic?

In fact, it raises another interesting question: Would the SCOTUS justices themselves follow this court order while it makes its way through the appeals process?

Another question that should be raised in this context is this: If President Trump stopped deporting illegal aliens based on court orders, and this resulted in more criminal activities or a major terrorist attack in the U.S., who will sit before the Congress and take responsibility for this security failure?

Would the lower court judges face the music? Would SCOTUS justices? Or would it be the president of the country and its executive branch, because it is their constitutional duty to protect the nation? Where does the buck actually stop in cases of national security?

And here’s another question: Should the executive branch of the U.S. stop a war that is being waged to defend Americans' lives against foreign enemies if SCOTUS decides such a war is unconstitutional? Does SCOTUS have the constitutional authority to stop (or start) wars? If the answer is NO (and help me if I’m missing something, because I actually can’t find any such judicial authority in my copy of the U.S. Constitution), then the principle that the Supreme Court power is not unlimited must be established.

Finally, it is important to distinguish between a court order affecting someone as a private citizen as opposed to a court order affecting a person in his or her capacity as a professional in his or her field. For example, a doctor must follow a court order to stop annoying the neighbors with loud music, but the same doctor should not follow a court order that tells him or her not to give adrenaline to a patient in anaphylactic shock as this will simply result in the death of the patient.

The former is a court order to the doctor as a person while the latter is a court order to the doctor as a professional who likely knows a whole lot more about appropriate medical treatment than the judge. The same principle of following or not following court orders applies to the president and the executive branch of the government.

In brief, it is insane to follow a court order that might be reasonably expected to result in the rape and murder of American citizens.

We really need to inject a level of sanity in addressing the balance of powers between the three branches of the U.S. government.

The judicial branch is not first among equals, notwithstanding the self-proclaimed precedent set 222 years ago by Chief Justice Marshall in the constitutionally questionable decision in Marbury v. Madison when the court simply declared, on its own and with no authority other than its own declaration, that it reserved the right to void legislation it deemed unconstitutional.