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But the Constitution Says…

It’s seems that on a daily basis a new story comes out of Washington showing our government’s policy of ignoring the Constitution. I say it’s a policy because there is so much  that is blatantly unconstitutional, yet Congress, the President, and the Judicial branch don’t bat an eye to it.  Both political parties are guilty of this, but never before has so much been happening in so little time. To name just a few recent instances, we’ve had the TARP program (Bush started it, Obama expanded and distorted it), the Stimulus, the Cap and Trade bill, the pending Health Care bill, the Cash for Clunkers program, Obama’s desire to have judges who rule with ‘empathy’, numerous Czars who are not appointed by Congress, government ownership and seizure of private businesses, turning bankruptcy law upside-down in order to pay back the unions in the GM bankruptcy, and on and on it goes.  If you can think of some more, leave a comment and maybe we can get a good collection going.

The Constitutional story for today that got my attention was an AP article about the House vote to regulate how much a private citizen of a bailed out company can get paid.  According to the article, “Passage of the bill on a 237-185 vote followed the disclosure a day earlier that nine of the nation’s biggest banks, which are receiving billions of dollars in federal bailout aid, paid individual bonuses of $1 million or more to nearly 5,000 employees.”  What’s so bad about this you ask?  It’s bad because it will further harm these struggling companies.  Why does the government want to hamstring hurting companies, who were forced to accept a bailout, by limiting their ability to give bonuses?  I don’t think there was any Constitutional authority for these companies to be bailed-out by the taxpayer in the first place, but since we can’t change the past I now want these companies to do well so they can pay back my tax dollars.  If a company is not allowed to give bonuses then it will not be able to retain talented employees and/or recruit new ones.  If some smart and talented executive is looking for a job is he or she going to pick a company where Congress can step in and say, “wait a second, you can’t get paid that much”?  No, of course not!  Instead, they will go to the company that can give them a big bonus if they do a great job.  The bailed-out companies are the ones who need executive talent the most.  Why are the liberals in Congress trying to keep them from getting it?

I personally don’t agree with a company giving bonuses just for the sake of giving bonuses.  However, it’s not the government’s job to regulate salaries and bonuses (it’s not the government’s job to bail out companies either). With that said, I don’t think the majority of businesses give frivolous bonuses, simply for the fact that it’s a bad business practice and is not beneficial to the company.  What is helpful to a company is giving a great executive, who is a valuable asset, a bonus for their hard work.  Even if the company as a whole is losing money, it’s still a good idea to give a valuable executive a bonus, if financially possible.  For instance, say there is a bailed-out company that is on a course to loose 500 million this year.  The company then designates a talented executive to do everything in their ability to minimize the predicted loses.  Now, if this executive does an amazing job and the company only loses 200 million, is that executive not entitled to a bonus?  Would it be wrong to pay that executive a 1 million dollar bonus for saving the company 300 million?  It would be a way of saying,  “Thank you.  We appreciate your hard work and abilities.  Please stay with the company so you can help us get out of this hole”.

Congress and the executive branch weren’t designed to run businesses, so why are they doing it?  Where do they get the authority to do it?  Our government exists because “We the People” gave authority to it in the form of the Constitution.  Nowhere in the Constitution is government given the authority do do most of what it does today.  If our government had stuck to the Constitution we would never had gotten into this expensive mess.  We probably would never have had the subprime mortgage crisis either.  When the government deviates from the Constitution bad things happen and tyranny grows.  We the people, must remind the government that they do not have the authority to do anything that is not granted to them by the Constitution.

Related posts:

1. Arlen Specter Says He is Encouraging Constitutional Rights
2. Democrat Mark Warner says Government Health Care is not in the Constitution
3. Rep. Slaughter’s Plan to Trash the Constitution
4. What Gives Them the Right to Make Me Pay for Their Health Care?

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