Gene Healy Says U.S. Presidents Aren’t Worth Celebrating

As
law professor Garrett Epps has noted, the Framers did something new
under the sun with the creation of the presidency. But “it wasn’t
their best work.” The Framers thought they’d made separation of
powers largely self-executing: Ambition would counteract ambition,
so that, in Madison’s words, “the private interest of every
individual may be a sentinel over the public rights.” But the
mechanism doesn’t work as planned: The private interests of
individual congressmen lead them to cede power to the executive
branch and focus on reelection. Congress rarely guards its
institutional turf—yet every president ends up leaving the
presidency stronger than he found it. The results are nothing to
celebrate. Every year, there are conservatives who complain about a
“War on Christmas.” If there’s ever a War on Presidents Day, writes
Gene Healy, sign me up.

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