Presidential executive orders grant a significant degree of emergency power to divisions of the executive branch. These powers are centered in an agency of the federal government known as the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).
FEMA itself came into existence by means of an executive order.
Please note, an emergency is defined by federal law as any occasion or instance for which, in the determination of the President, federal assistance is needed to supplement state and local efforts and capabilities to save lives and to protect property and public health and safety, or to lessen or avert the threat of a catastrophe in any part of the United States.
"What the War and Emergency Powers Act does, in conjunction with the above-mentioned executive orders, is to enable the President to “Suspend the Constitution at will”.
All the President needs to justify this action is to declare a national emergency.
Again, that it is the President himself who declares the emergency; not Congress.
Americans should never tolerate the suspension of their Constitutional rights under any circumstance, even when the situation is labeled with an “emergency” status.
Also, think about this for a moment “Homeland Security” has the right to suspend your rights as a “Citizen of the United States of America” at anytime no questions asked or answered.
I love the United States of America, I just don’t like what the “Lawyers” that are continually elected and re-elected back into office are doing to us all!
This is quite simple: there is no law or power under executive order to suspend the Constitution. That is total, absolute, undeniable conspiracy nonsense. All the powers exercised by the Federal government flow from the Constitution, and there are absolutely no secret processes or magic words that allow any branch of the government to usurp powers it is not given by the Constitution. The existence of FEMA does not change the foundational documet of our government by even one micro speck.
My thoughs are that as Ravenman has pointed out you are misinformed.
Would you please share with us where you got the ideas stated in your original post? Unfortunately there is a great deal of misinformation on the 'net.
Huh, FEMA death camps. One of the rarer nutball ideas encountered on the SDMB.
[hijack]Has anyone bothered to develop ecological models of wacko ideas? This could be highly [del]Illuminati[/del] illuminating. Has some other woo idea recently moved elsewhere, leaving a niche in the SDMB ecosystem? And the FEMA dictatorship idea… what ideas does it feed on? Does it have any natural predators? What would happen if you introduced a population of FEMA deathcampers to a habitat dominated by the Moon Landing Hoax? [/hijack]
The President can arbitrarily decide when there’s an emergency
and
The President can use FEMA to do whatever it takes to deal with it
That’s not the same as suspending the constitution – for one, if he did something particularly bad I don’t think “state of emergency!” is going to prevent Congress from impeaching him rather quickly. Not to mention you also have to posit that FEMA itself has enough willing members throughout the whole organization that are willing to just do something terrible because the President cried wolf. And it’s not like you can say the President can just fire them and put new ones in place until they listen, there’s a reason the Senate has to confirm executive appointments.
ETA: That’s not to say it’s impossible for the President to just up and declare martial law and take over the US – but the circumstances under which it could happen are the same as any other first world nation – it would require a lot of military and popular support behind the President and a lot of hate against the rest of the government. Even then, it wouldn’t flow from existing laws and precedents, it would amount to a military coup.
While FEMA came into existence under an EO, it has statutory authority as granted by Congress. So while your specific point is accurate, your innuendo holds no support.
Cite?
The hype has been in existence since Lincoln. It’s been discussed here before that Lincoln illegally imposed martial law (Ex parte Milligan).
I cannot find a “War and Emergency Powers Act.” It seems more of a catch-phrase to rally like-minded <insert your favorite description here>. There is the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012, signed into law by Obama in December 2011. Keep in mind the bill had the strong support of the Republican-led House. So if the attempt of the OP is to blame Obama, the bill was a Republican-led effort, especially with the contentious parts of the bill.
In fact, when Obama signed the bill, he had reservations:
If your concern is generic, as to the rights of all Americans, and those under which the Constitution protects, I think your fear is misguided, to a point. I say to a point, if you also have an honest intent according to Jefferson:
[ul]
[li] “When the people fear the government, there is tyranny. When the government fears the people, there is liberty.”[/li][li] “All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent.”[/li][li] “I hope we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our monied corporations which dare already to challenge our government to a trial by strength, and bid defiance to the laws of our country.”[/li][/ul]
However, if the intent of the OP is political, under the current president, this thread needs to be moved to GD so your innuendo can be properly addressed, dissected, and dismissed by more learned members.
I wonder if our OP has stumbled across the Continuity of Government provisions and either completely misunderstood them or was led to completely misunderstand them.
Thank you Colibri, people like you prove my point, any question contrary to the norm is considered subversive; FEMA exist, Presidential Executive Orders Exist, Homeland Security Exist, Judges putting people in jail for contempt because they failed to appear to answer questions exist!
I am a Citizen of the United States of America, a US Army Vet, and Voter!
I have the right to question my government, because I should not be afraid of those who are elected to serve the people!
What the holy crap are you talking about? Your thread, which does not have a factual answer because it’s pretty much pure conspiracy theory woo, was moved to the forum which deals, in part, with pure conspiracy theory woo by a moderator of the PRIVATE message board that you posted it on. How that proves any kind of point about anything having to do with the federal government I have no idea. It does, however, prove several points about the basic unreality of your worldview.