“I will shatter the Deep State, and restore government that is controlled by the People.” - President-elect Donald J. Trump
The growth of the unconstitutional "fourth branch" has been utilized by the financial oligarchy to undermine the American System of political economy -- and thereby strangle the physical economy of the United States — over the last eighty to one hundred years. This article concentrates on two questions: One, for what purpose and how is this Deep State (ie: "Swamp," "Blob," or -- a more sterile, sociological term - "administrative state") -- organized? Two, how is it to be defeated?
No doubt about it, it is important to get all of Trump's cabinet appointments into their positions quickly! Likewise to utilize the new-found clout of Americans to organize a toughened, more intelligent Congress to carry out the best DOGE reforms, draining the swamp, promoted to the public by Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamey.
One week before Christmas the American citizens won round one. The Congress attempted to ram through a 1,500 page continuing resolution to protect their interest and cover-up the criminal actions of the J-6 investigative committee, and they were soundly defeated. Thanks to a mobilization of Americans, spear-headed by J.D. Vance, Elon, and Vivek utilizing "X."
Despite this victory, those RINOs and Democrats are still working to protect something. What?
Siloed Federal Agencies
What about those siloed agencies? Recall the FBI that illegally spied on then-President Trump and promoted Russiagate, while it persecuted ordinary citizens, including citizen activists on school board and anti-abortion matters. (It is will known that the same FBI maintain files on Congress. Then there are the 51 former top intelligence officials who spread the lie that Hunter Biden's laptop was a "Russian disinformation operation."
As well, the Defense Department refused to carry out then-President Trump's orders to pull US troops out of Syria. Another example: when Russ Vought and the Office and Management and Budget (OMB), at the lawful constitutional request of then-President Trump, put a hold on Pentagon and State Department funding of Ukraine to determine where the money was going, all hell broke lose and the President was impeached! Who should actually be in constitutional control of these out-of-control federal agencies?
The American people have spoken and elected their President, now he has appointed his cabinet. Almost all of the Senators who express 'concerns' voted to confirm Biden's appointments and made fools of themselves. Certainly they should now accept President-elect's Trump's wisdom in these matters and vote "Aye" to Trump's choices. There is a reason they are dragging their feet, and the so-called legacy media, owned by oligarchs and intertwined with NGO's and the intelligence community, are likewise hysterical.
Ending a Legal Horror Story
“...we have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it, away from the fog of the controversy.”
-- Speaker Nancy Pelosi, on the pending ACA legislation, in 2010
Two legalistic concepts, sophistical in nature, to remember: Delegation of Authority and Judicial Deference.
Everyone knows that delegation of authority is something that real leaders judiciously use. Here, examination will point to its deliberate, sly manipulation and a disaster! The legal construct, judicial deference, will then be treated, just a few paragraphs on.
Both of these sophistries are in the process of being exposed and dumped by a combination of actions by the incoming second Trump administration, with important help from the U.S. Supreme Court. The American people can and must help President Trump, as they have in killing the 1,500 page congressional Continuing Resolution in December.
* Delegation of Authority - administrative agencies write laws…
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) 2010 statement, quoted above, was not unique.
In recent decades, Congress quickly considers bills and passes them in omnibus fashion, including language written in a deliberately vague fashion. The applicable agencies of the Deep State, operating with civil service protections, are then assigned to determine how to utilize them — and against whom. This is the domain of "statutory interpretation."
Dramatically, the Supreme Court in June of 2024 ruled there are inherent, constitutional limits to this process.
Indeed today, many federal administrative agencies still believe they are authorized to make and enforce their own laws and rules, and ranking RINOs and Democrats have scrambled to protect this illicit system.
Consider: The Environmental Protection Agency is continually writing new rules, and in recent years had them overturned by the Supreme Court. Independent agencies are empowered to issue commands to police, or act as their own court, as with the Security and Exchange Commission (SEC). The SEC can act as a quasi-court to adjudicate violations of its own regulations. The SEC can delegate the decision to an administrative law judge (ALJ), whose decisions can be appealed back to the SEC Commissioners or a United States Court of Appeals. The SEC can also pursue civil and criminal matters in federal court. The IRS and FBI are other, better known agency examples, which also maintain their own respective police force.
Nondelegation is then the constitutional principle that a branch of government cannot authorize another entity to exercise powers or functions assigned to itself. That the power of administrative agencies to write laws is unconstitutional, illegal, or otherwise invalid. Nor can they impose unwarranted, unconstitutional restrictions on Executive administrative agencies in their exercise of their responsibilities, for example the Executive Branch's "nerve center," the Office of Management & Budget.
* Judicial Deference - a second power utilized in the administrative state.
It occurs when a court defers to an agency's interpretation of a statute or regulation. It was only in 1984, in the case of Chevron U.S.A. Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., that the Supreme Court established a two-part framework for reviewing an agency's interpretation of a statute: when a statute is ambiguous or unclear, courts should defer to the agency's interpretation if it appears reasonable. This was the Chevron doctrine.
In technical terminology, "judicial deference" is a standard of judicial review. Sometimes the law is made by the legislature, and sometimes by the agency it is applied by. What happens, in either case, is that the court in effect agrees, "You guys know better than we do."
Together, delegation of authority and judicial deference have been the legalisms utilized for the corrupting expansion of the "Deep State," or unconstitutional "4th branch of government" in the United States. This in violation of U.S. Constitution's clear definition of three, and only three, branches of government, Executive, Legislative & Judicial. This 4th branch takes the form a growing number of regulatory agencies and policy making bureaucrats, with powers of rule-making and enforcement. The roots go back at least to the Enlightenment, the French Revolution, and first fascist regime of Napoleon Bonaparte. And perhaps further back to Venice and the procurators of St. Mark, the chapel of the Doge. They oversaw the family fortunes (Fondo), and wielded far-reaching power, in that most "Serene Republic" of Venice.
With the so-called Enlightenment, individuals were convinced to regard 'rational thought' as intellectually superior to faith, including faith in intellectually powerful religious principles, including Man as creator, understood as in the image of the living Creator. No American revolutions here. In the culture and the social hierarchy of the period and place, an impoverished, rationalized version of "reason" was substituted. It saw action as occurring only linearly, in an assumed Cartesian universe of empty Euclidean space; only a formal encyclopedic concept of accumulating knowledge, tethered to sense perception, was acceptable.
Disruptive discovery was effectively outlawed. Instead, there were only rules to be improved upon, by the 'disinterested' rule makers, making decisions based on dead formal logic. The selling point, then, was that this was far better than allowing politically or religiously partisan officials. It was a Venetian Aristotelianism of rulers and ruled -- with the right of designated "rule makers" to enforce a vague social contract. Under the outgoing avatar ‘Biden,’ we have seen this play out with imposed WOKE rule-making today!
Well, these chains, perhaps all of them, are in the process of being overturned! That is the good news. The outcome will be up to the American people and true leaders, as we have a republic to keep.
The Power of the Presidency Reasserted
The most important factor now in play is that, with President Trump's re-election and powerful mandate, Trump is willfully committed to assert the President's constitutional authority as the voice of the American people.
There are not, under the US Constitution, any "independent federal agencies." There are delegated responsibilities, but those federal employees work for the President and the American People! President-elect Trump, utilizing the powers of the First Branch of the federal government, the Executive, has made it clear that he is now intent on leading and will require -- or fire -- federal employees as necessary to carry out his promises to the American people.
Almost all federal agencies also fall under the executive branch of government. They will, with President Trump's second term, once again operate as agencies within the purview of the Executive Branch, even as they had been created by legislation. An estimate is that approximately 98% of federal employees are part of the executive branch, including those employed in various departments and agencies such as the Department of Defense, Department of State, and others.1 They all work for the President of the United States, his power derived from the consent of the governed.
This change is not yet entirely grasped by the public -- except as negatively expressed, to all within hearing range, by the oligarchical enemies of the nation, as in the hysteria and howling echoing through the halls of Congress -- or hollered about in the failing legacy media.
Further, the proverbial 'other shoe' has already dropped. The incoming President has, for the first time in many decades and at least in good part, the support of the US Supreme Court in the exercise of constitutional presidential powers.
The Constitutional "Third Branch" Reasserts Itself
In June, 2024, the Chevron Doctrine was overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court. The US Supreme Court's ruling, in Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, overturned the 40-year-old Chevron doctrine which required federal courts to defer to agency interpretations of ambiguous statutes!2
In the Majority Opinion authored by Chief Justice John Roberts, the Supreme Court ruled that, in truth, the Administrative Procedure Act (APA) of 1946 required courts to "decide all relevant questions of law" when reviewing agency actions. This meant federal courts must use their own judgment to interpret laws, not defer to agencies' interpretations.
The June, 2024 ruling overthrew the Chevron doctrine, established in the 1984 case Chevron U.S.A. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., 467 U.S. 837.3 The majority opinion stated that Chevron case had been based on a flawed assumption: that Congress intends to delegate interpretive authority to agencies whenever a law is ambiguous. This assumption does not reflect reality and (equally!) goes against the constitutional role of the federal courts.
Many, many federal court decisions that rested in part, or in whole, on the Chevron Doctrine, will be challenged over the coming months and years. The oligarchy's RINOs and Democrats in Congress are now desperately attempting to shore up their system with new legislation.
A Look Back:
The Foundation of the Constitutional "Third Branch"
It was in 1803, in Marbury v. Madison, that the U.S. Supreme Court first declared an act of Congress unconstitutional, thus establishing the doctrine of judicial review. The court's opinion, written by the great Chief Justice John Marshall, is rightly considered a foundation of U.S. constitutional law.
Article III, Section 2 of the Constitution states in part that “the supreme Court shall have original Jurisdiction” in “all Cases affecting Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, and those in which a State shall be Party,” and that “in all the other Cases before mentioned, the supreme Court shall have appellate Jurisdiction.”
Based on Article III, Section 2 of the Constitution and Marbury v. Madison, the United States federal courts have the authority to judicially review the statutes enacted by Congress, and declare a statute invalid if it violates the Constitution.4
A Constitutional Revival
So, in what has been covered, as regards the Supreme Court's overturning of the Chevron doctrine, there can be seen an important revival of the Constitutionally-defined Third Branch of Government, the Judicial Branch. The Court has more fully asserted its role, in the footsteps of Supreme Court Justice John Marshall in 1803.
This is critical and a virtual '18 wheeler' can be driven through the opening provided by the June, 2024 decision by the Supreme Court.
First, the decision already significantly frees the Executive Branch to act through its constitutional powers, no longer sandbagged by a system of judicially protected "independent agencies."
The President’s Power of Impoundment
Further, if indirectly, the overthrow of the Chevron doctrine also lays further groundwork for the restoration of the presidential powers such as impoundment on President Trump.5 With the 'Watergating' of the Nixon administration, the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974 (ICA) was put through, an unconstitutional action. As the Executive, under Article One of the Constitution, the President as the chief constitutional officer of the Executive Branch, is entrusted with supervisory and policy responsibilities, and has the power of judiciously impounding appropriated funds, a power notably exercised since 1801!
Ironically, the overturning of the 1974 ICA will also be a very important step in "freeing" the Constitution's Second Branch of Government -- the Legislative Branch of federal Government. The Congress has been played, each against all, and then forced to accept packages of legislation cooked up behind the scenes by willing handmaidens (“The Firm”) of the financial oligarchy, without meaningful congressional deliberation. Included therein are those vaguely written formulations that slyly hand-off powers to the selected "independent agencies" who then write, in effect, laws!
This has been a crucial form of oligarchical corruption, orchestrated from above, which grew up unchecked as consequence of the weakening of the Executive and Judicial branches. It also rendered the congress mostly dumb and impotent, and thereby hated by the vast majority of the American people.
The power of impoundment, together with other willful, constitutional actions by the incoming Trump administration, will target that entrenched “Deep State,” and promise to break the power of the corrupt Pelosi & McConnell-scheme of legislative despotism.
Impoundment will mean that the President will have recourse. The President will not be forced to accept or reject an omnibus bill -- shoved into his face at the moment of greatest budgetary or other crises -- and helpless to do anything in the aftermath. Instead, he has recourse to the impoundment -- and also reallocation -- of funds if required, undoing any attempt at any 'bums-rush.'
As a consequence of the President's restored power, Congressional members then can and must carefully consider -- and potentially negotiate -- each major legislative action it intends to send for signature to the President's desk. It will be a learning experience! The President will not be easily intimidated, and the apparent power of the on-high leadership of the Pelosi's and McConnell's will be there to dictate.
The power of the adminstrative state will be brought low, by Presidential and Supreme Court actions, and new found deliberations in the halls of Congress. What a mighty and blessed day for the American people! It is now up to the American people to secure the United States, once again, as a true democratic republic.
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There is much more that can be explored. Answering the question, “How did the ‘deep state’ came to be on these shores?” is one of them. This has been only been touched on here. Also it is important to consider the Executive Branch with its supervisory and policy responsibilities, and modern day capacities.
The production of the unconstitutional "fourth branch" has been a means by the Anglo-American financial oligarchy has undermined the American system of political economy, and therefore the physical economy of the United States. This has been abuilding, in waves, over the last eighty to one hundred years, and now it is to be undone. (To be continued.)
The Pendleton Civil Service Act of 1883, the cornerstone of federal employment law and the civil service, was intent on eliminating patronage in government appointments and establishing a merit-based system for the selection of government employees. Yet government employees could be fired - and were -- as well as hired. The Pendleton Act was put through, following the assassination of President James Garfield in 1881.
Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo - A group of commercial fishermen who regularly participate in the Atlantic herring fishery sued the National Marine Fisheries Service after the Service promulgated a rule that required industry to fund at-sea monitoring programs at an estimated cost of $710 per day. The fisherman argued that the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act of 1976 did not authorize the Service to create industry-funded monitoring requirements and that the Service failed to follow proper rulemaking procedure.
The "Chevron Doctrine" (The 1984 case Chevron U.S.A. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc.)
The 1984 decision involved a legal challenge to a change in the EPA’s interpretation of the word "source" in the Clean Air Act of 1963. The Act did not precisely define what constituted a "source" of air pollution. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) initially made rules defining "source" to cover any significant change or addition to a plant or factory. That meant that each addition or change to a factory or plant was then a new "source," and was subject to its own, lengthy review process under the EPA. This was onerous in its economic impact.
In 1981 during the Reagan presidency, the EPA changed its rules to identify each plant or factory, in its entirety, as a single "source" for EPA purposes. This allowed companies to build a range of new projects, such as adding onto an existing plant, without going through the EPA's lengthy new review process -- if the company avoiding any net change of emission by simultaneously modifying other parts of the plant.
The National Resources Defense Council (NRDC), the Wall Street & Hollywood funded "environmentalist" entity, challenged the legality of the EPA's new definition. The NRDC won the case in a lower federal court, but the Supreme Court overturned that decision and ruled in favor of Chevron, on the grounds that the courts should broadly defer to EPA and other independent regulatory agencies. In other words, the Supreme Court in 1983 ruled in favor of Chevron, but did so by throwing out the power of the Third Branch of government to carry out judicial review of rulemaking by federal agencies such as the EPA! The Chevron Doctrine then prevailed in federal courts for over forty years — until the June, 2024 Supreme Court ruling that overturned it.
However, the Constitution sets no express limits on how much federal authority can be delegated to a government agency. Rather, limits on the authority granted to a federal agency occur within the statutes enacted by Congress. In 1948, Congress bestowed on government agencies the authority to adjudicate administrative matters. Then in 1974, the Supreme Court qualified that authority, stating that federal court deference in adjudicating administrative matters depends on a federal agency interpretation being consistent with the agency's other statements and being consistent with the congressional purpose:
"We have recognized previously that the weight of an administrative interpretation will depend, among other things, upon "its consistency with earlier and later pronouncements" of an agency."
The 1983 Chevron ruling thoroughly undermined even that weak qualification.
https://americarenewing.com/the-presidents-constitutional-power-of-impoundment/
Brian, this paper is outstanding! Thank you so much! I've been some what suspicious of this sort of thing by gov't agencies for a very long time. During the late 60's I was a part of the income tax/ IRS policies resistance movement until some of my associates began going to jail. One of the things we learned about the IRS was that they actually wrote changes and rules in the federal tax laws and submitted those changes and rules to Congress which passed laws in that respect. We new then that that was un-Constitutional, but no one listened to us and treated us as trouble makers. Noel