A reader asked whether the U.S. is still in an official state of emergency, and if so, what that means.
The answer is yes, we are still in a state of emergency.
On September 11, 2001, the government declared a state of emergency. That declared state of emergency was formally put in writing on 9/14/2001:
“Anational emergency exists by reason of the terrorist attacks at theWorld Trade Center, New York, New York, and the Pentagon, and thecontinuing and immediate threat of further attacks on the United States.
NOW,THEREFORE, I, GEORGE W. BUSH, President of the United States ofAmerica, by virtue of the authority vested in me as President by theConstitution and the laws of the United States, I hereby declare thatthe national emergency has existed since September 11, 2001 . . . .”
Thatdeclared state of emergency has continued in full force and effect from9/11 [throughout the Bush administration] to the present.
On September 10 2009, President Obama continued the state of emergency:
Theterrorist threat that led to the declaration on September 14, 2001, ofa national emergency continues. For this reason, I have determined thatit is necessary to continue in effect after September 14, 2009, thenational emergency with respect to the terrorist threat.
Does a State of Emergency Really Mean Anything?
Does a state of emergency really mean anything?
Yes, it does:
The Washington Times wrote on September 18, 2001:
“Simplyby proclaiming a national emergency on Friday, President Bush activatedsome 500 dormant legal provisions, including those allowing him toimpose censorship and martial law.”
Isthe Times correct? Well, it is clear that pre-9/11 declarations ofnational emergency have authorized martial law. For example, as summarizedby a former fellow for the Hoover Institution and the National ScienceFoundation, and the recipient of numerous awards, including the GarySchlarbaum Award for Lifetime Defense of Liberty, Thomas Szasz Awardfor Outstanding Contributions to the Cause of Civil Liberties, LysanderSpooner Award for Advancing the Literature of Liberty and TempletonHonor Rolls Award on Education in a Free Society:
In1973, the Senate created a Special Committee on the Termination of theNational Emergency (subsequently redesignated the Special Committee onNational Emergencies and Delegated Emergency Powers) to investigate thematter and to propose reforms. Ascertaining the continued existence offour presidential declarations of national emergency, the SpecialCommittee (U.S. Senate 1973, p. iii) reported:
“These proclamations give force to 470 provisions of Federal law. . . . taken together, [they] confer enough authority to rule the country without reference to normal constitutional processes.Under the powers delegated by these statutes, the President may: seizeproperty; organize and control the means of production; seizecommodities; assign military forces abroad; institute martial law;seize and control all transportation and communications; regulate theoperation of private enterprise; restrict travel; and, in a plethora ofparticular ways, control the lives of all American citizens.”
(Most or all of the emergency powers referred to by the above-quoted 1973 Senate report were revoked in the late 1970’s by 50 U.S.C. Section 1601.However, presidents have made numerous declarations of emergency sincethen, and the declarations made by President Bush in September 2001 arestill in effect).
It is also clear that the White House has keptsubstantial information concerning its presidential proclamations anddirectives hidden from Congress. For example, according to StevenAftergood of the Federation of American Scientists Project onGovernment Secrecy:
“Ofthe 54 National Security Presidential Directives issued by the [GeorgeW.] Bush Administration to date, the titles of only about half havebeen publicly identified. There is descriptive material or actual textin the public domain for only about a third. In other words, there aredozens of undisclosed Presidential directives that define U.S. nationalsecurity policy and task government agencies, but whose substance is unknown either to the public or, as a rule, to Congress.”
As former United States congressman Dan Hamburg wrote in October:
While… Congress and the judiciary, as well as public opinion, “canrestrain the executive regarding emergency powers,” nothing of the sorthas occurred. Under the 1976 National Emergencies Act (50 U.S.C.1601-1651), Congress is required to review presidentially declaredemergencies. Specifically, “not later than six months after a nationalemergency is declared, and not later than the end of each six-monthperiod thereafter that such emergency continues, each House of Congressshall meet to consider a vote on a joint resolution to determinewhether that emergency shall be terminated.” Over the past eight years,Congress has failed to obey its own law, a fact that casts doubt on thelegality of the state of emergency.
As far as public opinion isconcerned, how many Americans are even aware that a state of emergencyeven exists. For that matter, how many members of Congress know? …
TheObama administration is essentially arguing that the United States iscurrently in a state of resisting foreign invasion a full eight yearsafter the attacks of 9/11!
This is ludicrous. [Dr. Harold C.Relyea, a specialist in national government with the CongressionalResearch Service (CRS) of the Library of Congress] argues that Congressand the judiciary, as “co-equal branches of constitutional government,”serve as a check on the executive power. As we have seen, Congress haseither been shut out of this process, or, as in so many cases, it hascapitulated. Dr. Relyea then offers that public opinion can restrainthe executive. But the public doesn’t even know they’re living under astate of emergency. The media doesn’t report it, and the government iscertainly not in the business of providing information that might raisethe hackles of real Americans.
It’s time for the American peopleto rise to this challenge. Write your member of Congress, and yoursenators. Tell them to obey their own laws. Tell them to end this phonyand treacherous state of emergency that imperils the freedom of us all.
Hamburg’smust-read article also discusses the suspension of Possse Comitatus,the operation of Northcom inside the U.S., and the refusal of theDepartment of Homeland Security to provide information on the state ofemergency to Congress or even to Congress members on the HomelandSecurity committee with the highest security clearances.
The Effect of a State of Emergency on the Economy and Business
Thecontinuous state of emergency in effect from September 2001 to thepresent may have had a substantial affect on the economy and business.
Initially,as William K. Black – senior regulator during the S&L crisis,professor of Economics and Law, and an expert on white collar financialcrime – has repeatedly pointed out, the government knew about anepidemic of mortgage fraud a long time ago. For example, the FBI warnedof an “epidemic” of mortgage fraud in 2004. However, the FBI, DOJ andother government agencies putted their agents off of financial fraudinvestigation and forced them to focus on terrorism instead. See this and this
And as Reuters noted last week:
U.S.securities regulators originally treated the New York Federal Reserve’sbid to keep secret many of the details of the American InternationalGroup bailout like a request to protect matters of national security, according to emails obtained by Reuters.
The national security claim may seem outlandish, but it is nothing new.
As Business Week wrote on May 23, 2006:
President George W. Bush has bestowed on his intelligence czar, John Negroponte, broad authority, in the name of national security, to excuse publicly traded companies from their usual accounting and securities-disclosure obligations.
Inother words, national security has been discussed for years as a basisof keeping normal accounting and securities-related disclosures secret.While “national security” and a state of “national emergency” may notbe exactly the same, they are variations of a single theme – anexistential threat to our nation – which has dominated American sinceSeptember 11.
Similarly, Congressman Brad Sherman, Congressman Paul Kanjorski and Senator James Inhofe all say that the government warned of martial law if Tarp wasn’t passed.
Last year:
- Senator Leahy said “If we learned anything from 9/11, the biggest mistake is to pass anything they ask for just because it’s an emergency”
- The New York Times wrote:
“Therescue is being sold as a must-have emergency measure by anadministration with a controversial record when it comes to askingCongress for special authority in time of duress.”***
Mr.Paulson has argued that the powers he seeks are necessary to chase awaythe wolf howling at the door: a potentially swift shredding of theAmerican financial system. That would be catastrophic for everyone, heargues, not only banks, but also ordinary Americans who depend on theirfinances to buy homes and cars, and to pay for college.
Some aresuspicious of Mr. Paulson’s characterizations, finding in his warningsand demands for extraordinary powers a parallel with the way the Bushadministration gained authority for the war in Iraq. Then, the WhiteHouse suggested that mushroom clouds could accompany Congress’s failureto act. This time, it is financial Armageddon supposedly on thedoorstep.
“This is scare tactics to try to do something that’s inthe private but not the public interest,” said Allan Meltzer, a formereconomic adviser to President Reagan, and an expert on monetary policyat the Carnegie Mellon Tepper School of Business. “It’s terrible.”
Mostof the Fed and Treasury’s looting of America to funnel trillions inbailouts, loans, guarantees, and other favors to the too big to failswas done under the justification of an “emergency”.
I don’tknow whether the official declaration of a “state of emergency” ineffect from September 2001 to today was directly used for financiallooting. But again, the fear of an existential threat to our countrywas used to justify the looting.
And many people allege that thegovernment has taken drastic steps to manipulate market prices. Iftrue, the president’s ability to use emergency powers to “stabilize themarkets” no doubt makes manipulation easier.
Congress Has the Power to Revoke the State of Emergency
A note to Congressional staffers: Congressman Hamburg is right. Congress does have the power to revoke the state of emergency.
Specifically, the National Emergencies Act, 50 U.S.C. Sections 1601-1651 (passed in 1976), gives Congress the power to countermand a presidential declaration of national emergency. Indeed, in 1976, Congress rescindedall of the declarations of national emergency made since World War II,as many of them had been on the books for years and were giving theexecutive unrestricted powers which were undermining the Constitution.
In 1983, the Supreme Court struck downa portion of Congress’ power to countermand a declaration of nationalemergency. But Congress got around that ruling by amending the NationalEmergencies Act in 1985 to confirm Congress’ power to countermand -through a joint resolution between the House and Senate – a declarationof emergency by the president (see this).
Moreover, in 2007, the Bush Administration tried to ignore the National Emergencies Act by issuing National Security and Homeland Security Presidential Directive 51. But that dog won’t hunt. The Constitution does not allow the president to unilaterally cut Congress out of the picture.
As former Chicago Federal Reserve economist and Senior Morningstar equity analyst William Bergman wrote in 2001:
LordActon’s famous saying that ‘power corrupts, and absolute power corruptsabsolutely’ provides a valuable warning. In light of the sweepingpowers seemingly provided by statutes like 12 U.S.C. 95a and 12 U.S.C.95(a), those who care about democratic principles and freedom may wishto monitor the implications of these and other laws for governmentchoices before conditions arise giving rise to assertions of emergencyauthority, in addition to behavior arising amidst an emergency itself.This study could usefully include a renewed assessment of theconstitutionality of these and other emergency statutes, as well asmore fundamental review of their welfare implications per se, includingwork along the lines produced for the Senate Special Committee toTerminate the National Emergency in 1973.[i]
[i] See for exampleSpecial Committee on the Termination of the National Emergency,“Emergency Powers Statutes: Provisions of Federal Law Now in EffectDelegating to the Executive Extraordinary Authority In Time of NationalEmergency.” United States Senate Report 93-549; November 19, 1973.
PORT ST. LUCIE, Fla. — A Port St. Lucie first-grade student was handcuffed and committed to a mental health facility because of her classroom behavior, and her parents are furious that the school took such extreme measures.
Free Your Mind News 