I write letters...to Arlen Specter

The Honorable Senator Arlen Specter
711 Hart Building
Washington, D.C. 20510

Senator Specter:

Senator, I hope this letter finds you well, and I hope you have a Happy Hanukah as well as a Happy New Year. Unfortunately, this letter is a call for action on your part, in response to the actions of the Executive Branch.

The decision to reelect you last fall was a difficult one, but one in hindsight that I do not regret. I have been registered as an Independent my entire voting life, however, the actions of this Administration, along with that of your peers, has pushed me farther to the left than I could have thought possible. As such, I was eager to make a statement in the election booth intending to vote straight Democrat. The near-certainty that you would be chairman of the Judicial Committee, gave me pause. I would much prefer you, someone with a moderate-to-liberal track record, in Congress rather than some unknown quantity. In that, your liberal streak served as a "check and balance" against a rightward listing Congress, especially as far as the nomination of Supreme Court Justices was concerned.

The constant assault on the legislature has resulted in the public's low level of satisfaction with the institution of Congress, and a gradual strengthening of the Executive Branch. Coupled with a Supreme Court majority sympathetic to a strong Executive Branch, and Congress will be effectively neutered. By this Congress reluctance to "speak truth to power", they are tacitly eroding their own strength, both now and for the foreseeable future. We have a Secretary of State who believes that the Attorney General is "the highest legal authority in the country" (12/19/2005, CNN), a Director of the NSA who misled Congress in testimony (Joint House And Senate Select Intelligence Committee, 10/2002), a (now-former) Justice Department Official who believes any action short of organ failure or death is NOT torture (6/8/2004, Washington Post) as well as maintaining that the President did not need Congress consent to undertake military action in Iraq (10/23/2005, Boston Globe) or if need be in Syria , as well as an Attorney General who is under the impression that Congress had given the President a figurative blank check (12/19/2005, White House Briefing) on the limits of his powers for the War on Terror. Most disconcerting, if the President feels justified in his action due to the "War", these powers will have no oversight, no "check" by Congress or the Courts, no avenue for notification via the Freedom of Information Act or the Press, and most importantly, no expiration or limits. Simply put, the President now wears a crown.

Like frogs in a pot, in your parties collective desire to foment party solidarity and cement a majority, you and your peers in Congress have unwittingly marginized yourselves and empowered this out-of-control executive branch, unaware of the gradually warming water. For these last two-plus centuries, every American Studies class has been schooled about the importance of the "separation of powers" and "checks and balances". Unfortunately, those concepts are scarcely evident in our modern government.

At this point in your legislative career, especially given the physical hardships you have endured, one may assume your eventual retirement must be on your mind, unless you plan to compete with the longevity of Strom Thurmond. One would assume that you are beginning to think of your legacy, how you will be remembered, who's lives you have affected, and what you have left behind.

I ask you to reflect on your legacy, and to act as other patriots did in Philadelphia so many years ago. Despite grave risks to their person and reputation, they stood up to a tyrant named George, and vowed that certain rights were inalienable, and offenses against those rights were grave enough to warrant extreme measures.

As you reflect on this, I urge you to review the documents that underpin our government, the Declaration of Independence, the Bill of Rights, and the Constitution, and read them as a MAN and as an AMERICAN, not as a Republican, and ask yourself if you are being true to the word and the spirit of the founding fathers. Throughout your career, you have "spoke truth to power", whether as a Republican District Attorney fighting corruption in Philadelphia, criticizing the conduct of your own party at the conclusion of the Clinton Impeachment, and your politically brazen warnings to the President over the future of the Supreme Court. I hope that you will once again answer the call now that your country needs you.

Again, I wish you the happiest of Holidays, and hope to receive your response soon.

Sincerely,

rzklkng