Constitutional Amendment (Passed)

[HagridOfTheDeep]

Aye

I believe a pardon is a pardon. The reason the president has the power to pardon individuals is because he or she is supposed to be the arbiter of the will of the people. In other words, the electorate entrusts that power to the president. If they entrust someone to the office of the presidency who commits a crime and pardons him or herself, well... in a way, that was the people's will. The pardon is an exceptional power in anyone's hands, so having the ability to pardon oneself or not is kind of moot. If a "bad person" gets into the position of having the power to grant a pardon, there's a moral quandry there whether the person has the authority to pardon Joe Blow, Jane McLean, or even anyone... including him or herself. Creating this exception is picking at something that doesn't really matter.

[HagridOfTheDeep]

Aye

A pardon is a pardon, suffering the consequences of who the people put in the White House, sacred power, etc., etc.

[HagridOfTheDeep]

Yes, my "aye" was in support of the "no revoking pardons" thing. We can and should make this amendment more gender neutral at the first chance once we're done here.

[HagridOfTheDeep]

Why are we voting on this most recent amendment? Unless I'm missing something (possible), the sponsor never said it was unfriendly.

[HagridOfTheDeep]

Abstain

[HagridOfTheDeep]

Yes.

I'm loosely paraphrasing Arthur in Excalibur when he said, "They're not laws if they don't apply to everyone" or something closely to that effect. So, I guess what I see is that without this, if someone became President who had a strong personality cult behind him (or her), he (or she ) could get away with literally anything.

The president having the power to pardon anyone undermines those laws, though. So barring presidents from pardoning themselves really just creates a false distinction that makes it possible for us to eat away at the powers the founders intended presidents to have.

Anyway, I realize debate is over, so I'll shut up.