“Experience keeps a dear school, but fools will learn in no other.” Benjamin Franklin
Many prattling about the Rule of Law and Our Sacred Constitution these many years have no problem with President Trump usurping Congress’s constitutionally specified “. . . Power to lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, . . .” (Article I, Section 8) by issuing his Liberation Day decree setting dramatically higher tariffs. This was based on a negative balance of trade since 1976, for which no other president from Carter to Biden saw fit to declare an emergency and end run the Constitution.
Fortunately, Trump’s state of emergency lasted less than a week; or it’s being held in abeyance for 90 days; or it will be declared and undeclared on even and odd days of the month. Trump sold his decree as a long-term plan that would make American manufacturing great again. There would be some pain, but it would be worth it. Those who cited history (particularly Smoot-Hawley and the Great Depression) and the well-established economic case against tariffs were either ignored, pilloried, or assured by the Trump faithful that he was again playing 4D chess; the announcement was just a negotiating tactic.
