(Also, for what it’s worth, I read the last recommendation a bit differently than you did: Rather than urging a requirement for judicial review of legislative intent, I think the ABA was encouraging review of executive intent. (“The [ABA] urges Congress to enact legislation . . . to seek judicial review . . . in any instance in which the President claims the authority, or states the intention, to disregard or decline to enforce all or part of a law he has signed . . .” See also p. 26 of the recommendations report.))

As to the findings, I agree that the President should veto bills he considers unconstitutional – President Bush’s signing of McCain-Feingold was simply wrong given his correct mis-givings about the bill. But much of the rest of the recommendations are just silly – the President should not have to present “official” signing statements to the Congress. And despite the legion of “living constitutionalists” who embrace Judicial review for just about everything, such judicial review should not be encouraged as the last word on legislative intent (which is how I read the last recommendation) – Justice Stevens spectacular botching of that in Hamdan should have us all suspicious of the Court’s ability to do this correctly.

Finally, this line from the report surely qualifies as a howler:

“Our recommendations are not intended to be, and should not be viewed as, an attack on

the current President.”

(I mean why else would the ABA House of Delegates vote for the resolution if it wasn’t an attack on this President)

How about addressing the findings nonetheless?

The ABA continues to make the case for its own irrelevancy