ON PRESIDENTIAL POWER, DEMENTIA, AND THE LIMITS OF THE FORGER’S PEN
By a jurist of sound mind, strict text, and sharpened pen
“The Constitution is not a living organism. It is a legal document. Let us interpret it as such.”
— Antonin Scalia
There exists in the Constitution no provision for familial succession of power — not to a wife, nor to a son, nor to a panel of loyal physicians, and most certainly not to a cabal of forgery artists. Yet, suppose — in a republic still governed by law — that a sitting President, aged and afflicted with unmistakable signs of dementia, becomes the unwitting centerpiece of a criminal operation led by his own wife and son. Their object? Not the nation’s good, nor even his dignity — but rather, the fraudulent issuance of nearly two thousand presidential pardons. Let us examine what the law says, what the Constitution demands, and what this grotesque scenario reveals about the vulnerabilities of our constitutional order.
I. The Power to Pardon — and Its Limits
Article II, Section 2 of the United States Constitution states:
“The President shall have Power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offences against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment.”
Simple enough. No statute, regulation, or tradition overrides the President’s plenary power to pardon federal offenses. But — and this is essential — the Constitution vests that power in the President alone. Not in a proxy, not in a spouse, and not in a committee of kin.
The power must be personally exercised, and even though no formalistic rubric is required (no golden seal, no ceremonial act), the act of pardoning must emanate from the President’s will. A document purporting to be a pardon, when the President is neither aware of its existence nor capable of authorizing it, is not a pardon at all — it is a counterfeit.
II. Forgery: The Act that Kills the Act
Let’s not mince words: forging the signature of the President on legal instruments is not merely a bureaucratic infraction. It is a federal crime. Under 18 U.S.C. § 494, any person who “falsely makes, alters, forges or counterfeits” any writing for the purpose of defrauding the United States is guilty of a felony.
To forge a presidential pardon is to forge an act of state — a most sacred executive function. If the First Lady and the President’s son knowingly conspired to produce thousands of such forgeries, that is not only conspiracy to defraud the United States (18 U.S.C. § 371), it is also obstruction of justice and likely misprision of a felony by anyone who knew and failed to report it.
The recipient of such a pardon — if complicit — gains no benefit. Fraud vitiates everything, even presidential mercy.
III. Mental Incapacity: A Hard Truth, Not a Legal Shield
Does the Constitution require a President to be of sound mind every hour of every day? No. But if he is incapable of understanding the nature of his acts, he cannot legally issue them.
Still, the Constitution offers only one remedy for incapacity: the 25th Amendment.
Under Section 4, the Vice President and a majority of the Cabinet may declare the President “unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office,” transferring authority to the Vice President.
But absent this declaration — and in the absence of impeachment — the President remains the President. A man drooling on the Resolute Desk is still, formally, the Commander in Chief. And therein lies the danger: if those closest to him conspire to preserve the illusion of capacity, they effectively short-circuit the constitutional remedy.
IV. Legal Fallout: A Firestorm, Not a Footnote
This is not some clerical error. It is the most profound constitutional fraud in modern history.
-
The forgers (wife and son) could be indicted for forgery, fraud, conspiracy, obstruction, and abuse of public trust.
-
High officials who enabled or concealed this would be complicit in a criminal enterprise.
-
Congress would be within its rights — and duties — to initiate investigative hearings, impeach any remaining officials, and refer criminal findings to the Department of Justice.
What of the recipients? They cannot reasonably claim reliance on a fraudulent pardon. Once the fraud is proven, their shield is wooden, not iron, and prosecution may proceed.
V. The Lesson in Law and Civic Character
A nation of laws cannot survive if the mechanisms of accountability lie dormant — if the Vice President sees the light dim behind the President’s eyes and does nothing; if the Cabinet knows but remains silent; if the public is deceived by photo ops and statements drafted by handlers.
If a president suffers from dementia, that is a tragedy. If the nation allows power to be exercised in his name but without his mind, that is a scandal and a constitutional wound.
The Constitution is not a façade. It is a contract. And contracts are void where forged.
Conclusion
If a President, incapacitated by dementia, becomes the unwitting subject of a conspiracy in which his family fabricates nearly two thousand pardons, the law is not ambiguous: those pardons are invalid, the forgers are criminals, and the Republic has suffered a blow that demands not sentiment, but stern reckoning.
Let the Constitution speak — and let no son, no spouse, no well-dressed fraudster speak louder than the law.
No comments:
Post a Comment