In a social media post, President Trump claimed he was justified in breaking the law to “save” his country. He appears to be claiming what John Locke called emergency prerogative. According to Locke, when the survival of the nation was at stake, the executive could act outside the law and even against it. The best example of the application of this concept occurred during the Civil War when Abraham Lincoln operated outside the law on several occasions, saying, “Was it possible to lose the nation yet preserve the Constitution?”

Survival of the United States was very much at stake then, but do we face such a crisis now? Does the country need, as Trump claims, saving? Could it be that what Trump wants to save us from is merely those who disagree with him and his policies? That is not a struggle for national survival, it’s democracy. Lincoln felt it was his Constitutional duty to keep the nation from splitting in two and he was willing to go outside the law to do so. He believed claiming emergency prerogative, far from operating outside the Constitution, was a Constitutional duty when national survival demanded it. No such crisis exists today except in the mind of the president. He is claiming the same power minus the crisis. Taken in that context, his actions are simply a grab for power, not for the sake of the nation but simply for the sake of having more power.

Michael Pelchat

Webster