Essay Sample: Is the United States Facing a Constitutional Crisis?

The United States is on the edge of facing a constitutional crisis. Since President Donald Trump took office, there have been acts of political disruptions that have significantly affected governance. Trumps administration advocates for various policies like a strong defense, repeal of Obamacare, and deportation of illegal aliens. Not all that agrees with the policies instances that bring confusion on constitutional matters. What are the circumstances under which one can iterate that there is a constitutional crisis? In my view, it ought to be understood from the perspective of constitutional design failure and not from the point of legal disagreement. When arms of government disagree constitutionally, it does not imply the occurrence of a constitutional crisis. Circumstances under which a constitutional crisis is a probable include; if political leaders truly pursue constitutional provisions even when they are poorly designed resulting in political paralysis. Political leaders are deliberately violating the constitution, justifying grab of power as an emergency response that is not addressed in the constitution and lastly government institutions intensely contradicting on the manner in which to interpret the law and as a result use of force if the struggle exceeds ordinary political conflict (Matheson 56).

President Donald Trumps administration rendered the state to the verge of facing a constitutional crisis when he openly flouted court orders that appeared to overturn his executive order of banning all immigrants and refugees from seven Muslim nations. Since there were five different court orders given at different times, regarding a poorly-worded and vague executive order, the uncertainty was comprehensible. However, as much as Trumps administration iterated that it would abide by the court orders, denial of access and detention of lawyers continued an a sign of uneven compliance. The unprecedented ban on specified immigrants and refugees that was issued in Boston prevented secondary screening, detention, and deportation of people who were legally allowed to visit the United States at that time.

Legal challenges to the presidents order remain undecided. It is not clear whether the order unconstitutionally denied those arriving in the United States a right to experience the due process of law or discriminates on the grounds of religion. On the other hand, whether it infringes the immigration laws ban on discrimination on the grounds of nationality, residence, religion, and place of birth. The initial orders by the court were just quick actions to stop the detention or deportation harm that faced many people trapped in U.S. airports (American Government & Politics). In support of his command, the president argued that he was safeguarding the state from terrorism. Construction of a wall alongside the Mexican border was as well one of his moves to offer security. His actions did not follow the law thus a disagreement between the two parties. A disagreement on constitutional issues does not rely on imply a constitutional crisis for the state (Sitaraman 72).

After President Trump got into power with a comfortable majority in both houses (US House and Senate), he fired James Comey who was in the process of examining possible collusion between Mr. Trumps campaign and the Russian government. The dismissal of Comey is indeed not a constitutional crisis. The president was completely in the range of legal bounds in undertaking what he did. In ejecting James Comey for political grounds whether related to Russias interference in the election that saw Republicans emerge the winner, Trump ignored the norm of allowing the FBI director accomplish his full ten-year term. The standard practice keeps FBIs status as an independent and powerful agency with the competence of seriously examining the government as well as the president. In this case, Mr. Trump could have underutilized his power to safeguard democratic institutions.

Works Cited

American Government & Politics. Place of publication not identified: CENGAGE LEARNING CUSTOM P, 2017. Print.

Matheson, Scott M. Presidential Constitutionalism in Perilous Times. Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press, 2009. Print.

Sitaraman, Ganesh. The Crisis of the Middle Class Constitution: Why Economic Inequality Threatens Our Republic. , 2017. Print.