The Lichfield Group

This article appeared in the July 25, 2006 issue of the Washington Times.

As William Shakespeare would have versified, Rep. William J. Jefferson, Louisiana Democrat, deserved Speech or Debate Clause protection from an FBI raid of his congressional office not because congressional misconduct should be punished less but because the Constitution’s separation of powers that safeguard an uncowed legislative branch should be loved more.

This article appeared in the July 18, 2006 issue of the Washington Times.

Knowledge tempered by prudence is the cornerstone of our democratic dispensation. Popular moral sentiments and sensibilities give birth to the nation’s laws and leadership. Among the first duties of the president is to teach the people to make discriminating judgments, to exalt reason over dogmas, and to be alert to government abuses or follies. Otherwise, the nation’s democratic sinews will atrophy, as highlighted by the fetish for secrecy and anti-intellectualism of the Bush administration.

This article appeared in the July 11, 2006 issue of the Washington Times.

Congress should reject President Bush’s plea to authorize military commissions to try noncitizen illegal combatants for war crimes when they are already immobilized indefinitely at Guantanamo Bay.

This article appeared in the July 5, 2006 issue of the Washington Times.

President Bush entered office intending to enfeeble congressional or judicial checks on executive authority. The legal theory concocted was that the Constitution erected a “unitary executive” free from restraint or superintendence by coequal branches in exercising executive power.