Line Item Veto for President

Ronald Reagan asked for it in 1986 but never got it. Bill Clinton got it in 1996 but had it taken away by the courts.

And now Sens. John McCain and Russ Feingold want to grant line item veto power to President Barack Obama.

This debate is a perennial one with government reformers, but the maverick senators behind the landmark McCain-Feingold campaign finance law believe the timing is right again to push line item veto authority — and they plan to limit this power to just earmarks. Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) has signed on as the House co-sponsor of the legislation. The three lawmakers will unveil their proposal on Wednesday.

The line item veto was declared unconstitutional in 1998, when Clinton was president, but McCain and Feingold have designed their legislation so Congress still has final approval over the presidential line item vetoes, a provision designed to get around the premise that this violates the checks and balances in the Constitution. Politico

This is smart legislation. This puts the power back on the President. He/She can veto earmarks out of a bill and force Congress to override it. This brings these out into the open and takes away the hiding places for Congress. It also will hold the President accountable to the rhetoric they use during campaigns. They will no longer be able to say the want to get rid of earmarks, yet sign away on bills that contain say 8,500 plus earmarks.