Comment by zdragnar
1 day ago
The tariff was oppressive in large part because the colonies didn't have representation in Parliament and were allowed limited (and decreasing) local governance. The Stamp, Townshend and Intolerable Acts were a whole lot more than just "we don't wanna pay taxes".
A similar argument can be made against the tariffs though.
US consumers will be paying the bulk of the tariffs through price increases. We do have representatives in Congress, they just weren't the ones imposing tariffs.
edit: as fun as silent down votes are, it would be interesting to hear where you might disagree
Unfortunately the representatives in Congress gave the tariff power to the Presidency.
Now, did they do that with the approval of the voters? Ostensibly, yes, but in reality, it's not that clear-cut.
This would be more like if the Thirteen Colonies had MPs and those MPs still voted in favor of the Stamp Act, or they voted to delegate the power to tariff to someone with a severe personality disorder.
There are lawsuits arguing that Congress didn’t give the executive branch this power. They seem pretty persuasive to me and they’re successful so far, but we’ll see how the appeals process turns out.
1 reply →
It infuriates me just how much members of Congress have abdicated their jobs and given power to the president to make unilateral decisions. I wonder if we need a constitutional amendment (not that we could get such a thing to pass in this day and age), because it is a complete perversion of how our government is supposed to work.
For a long time now I've been banging the drum of "don't put power in the president's hands", because the downside has always been very clear to me: even if you trust the guy in office today, doesn't mean you will want the next guy to have that power. But people just don't care. They are quite happy to have unilateral power exercised by one man, because they don't bother to think through the consequences of such things.
2 replies →
I mean yes the American people should probably consider giving our current government the same taste. But they’re not going to do that because we’ve been trained to be complacent.
I fully agree tariffs should be the purview of Congress, but that's not a "similar argument". Trump was elected just as Congress was.
Trump was elected to be the president, a role itself meant to be the chief executive and public figurehead of the government. Trump was not elected to legislate and no single person should be given the power to do so.
edit: typo
Technically.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_representation
These tariffs may have representation, but constitutionally not from the right representative. Congress has the authority and only delegated it to the president in limited circumstances that don't apply. Trump says the ones on China are imposed for fentanyl being shipped in by mail and other means, and within days of saying that pardoned the largest opiates by mail operator in US history, Ross Ulbricht.
I don't feel represented on the national or international stage AT ALL. Maybe I'll stop paying mine.
> I don't feel represented on the national or international stage AT ALL. Maybe I'll stop paying mine.
Now gather a huge group of friends who are willing to fight for this cause (and for whose this cause is so important that they can accept ending in jail or even worse).
Be careful what you ask for. History has proven that such a group will exist at some point.
5 replies →
What you "feel" is irrelevant though? You have the option of voting.