# It's not a law! (rant)
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-a-law-rant/1013561
**Category:** The BBQ Pit
**Tags:** trump
**Created:** [January 29, 2025, 3:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-a-law-rant/1013561 "2025-01-29T03:11:50Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Skypist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skypist)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2025, 3:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-a-law-rant/1013561/1 "2025-01-29T03:11:50Z")
There was kind of an issue at work today because of the freezing of federal grants. We had people calling to ask if the “new law” would affect their grant.
I didn’t say anything but wanted to scream, “It’s not a law!” and, “A president cannot unilaterally write and pass a law!” and “Stop it!”
For one thing, it makes trump sound even more powerful and influential than he is, such that ignorant people just assume whatever he does is a “law,” and for another, wow, my fellow Americans are even dumber than I thought if they don’t know that Congress passes laws and the president signs or vetoes them.
Maybe it’s just colloquial talk and people are not being precise with their verbiage during a chaotic time, but I’m still pissed off. It’s a fucking memo.
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### Author:  [@crowmanyclouds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crowmanyclouds)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2025, 3:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-a-law-rant/1013561/2 "2025-01-29T03:16:13Z")
> [@Skypist](#):
>
> For one thing, it makes trump sound even more powerful and influential than he is, such that ignorant people just assume whatever he does is a “law,” and for another, wow, my fellow Americans are even dumber than I thought if they don’t know that Congress passes laws and the president signs or vetoes them.
It’s almost as if a Trump dictatorship is being normalized and accepted in advance.
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### Author:  [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2025, 3:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-a-law-rant/1013561/3 "2025-01-29T03:23:29Z")
I guessing the people who were calling to ask how this new government action were more concerned about how it would affect them then they were interested in what specific process the government used to create it. If Trump is able to do something by issuing an executive order that Congress could do by enacting a law then you might as well call the result a law.
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### Author:  [@Skypist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skypist)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2025, 3:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-a-law-rant/1013561/4 "2025-01-29T03:52:53Z")
Well, that’s another issue because how do we know how or even whether it’s going to affect them or not? Nobody really knew today if trump would walk it back or double down. Since it’s not a law, it’s a memo based on an executive order at best, it can be instituted at a moment’s notice (rather than set to take effect years later like laws often are) and can be rescinded quickly if The Sensitive One gets too much blowback.
I know our callers are just concerned, but it’d at least be nice if they had enough basic knowledge to know, without even thinking about it, that laws are not “passed” like that.
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### Author:  [@crowmanyclouds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crowmanyclouds)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2025, 3:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-a-law-rant/1013561/5 "2025-01-29T03:59:38Z")
> [@Skypist](#):
>
> I know our callers are just concerned, but it’d at least be nice if they had enough basic knowledge to know, without even thinking about it, that laws are not “passed” like that.
‘Sad news today, ‘Capital Hill’ Bill has died. No official statement from Congress but reports are that is was self immolation.’
[ ](https://wvecouncil.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/bill-1.jpg)
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### Author:  [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2025, 4:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-a-law-rant/1013561/6 "2025-01-29T04:03:05Z")
Good post, but it’s ‘Capitol Hill’ Bill.
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### Author:  [@crowmanyclouds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crowmanyclouds)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2025, 4:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-a-law-rant/1013561/7 "2025-01-29T04:06:29Z")
Speel check? Why you hate me?
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### Author:  [@Max\_S](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Max_S)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2025, 4:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-a-law-rant/1013561/8 "2025-01-29T04:17:21Z")
When polled, roughly 1/3 of Americans are consistently unable to name all three branches of government. Which was also the subject of a _Schoolhouse Rock!_ video, I think.
~Max
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### Author:  [@garygnu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/garygnu)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2025, 5:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-a-law-rant/1013561/9 "2025-01-29T17:58:32Z")
> [@Max\_S](#):
>
> all three branches of government
Evergreen, Deciduous, and Arthur, right?
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### Author:  [@Dinsdale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dinsdale)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2025, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-a-law-rant/1013561/10 "2025-01-29T18:15:13Z")
> [@Skypist](#):
>
> I didn’t say anything but wanted to scream, “It’s not a law!” and, “A president cannot unilaterally write and pass a law!” and “Stop it!”
Am I being too pedantic to observe that while it is not a “statute”, there are all manner of “laws” that do not require Congressional approval?
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### Author:  [@Skypist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skypist)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2025, 6:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-a-law-rant/1013561/11 "2025-01-29T18:16:27Z")
Yes. 😉
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### Author:  [@Ponderoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ponderoid)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2025, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-a-law-rant/1013561/12 "2025-01-29T18:25:32Z")
> [@Max\_S](#):
>
> Which was also the subject of a _Schoolhouse Rock!_ video, I think.
It was, but ABC didn’t play that one much on air, if at all. Something about not wanting to upset TPTB by calling the government a 3-ring circus. I didn’t learn that one existed until decades later.
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### Author:  [@Son\_of\_a\_Rich](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Son_of_a_Rich)
#### Post date: [January 30, 2025, 12:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-a-law-rant/1013561/13 "2025-01-30T00:37:25Z")
> [@Skypist](#):
>
> I know our callers are just concerned, but it’d at least be nice if they had enough basic knowledge to know, without even thinking about it, that laws are not “passed” like that.
Long ago a coworker announced that Obama had eliminated term limits. I knew it was bullshit, but I asked how. “Signing statements, like he does everything else!” I still regret not betting him on it.
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### Author:  [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)
#### Post date: [January 30, 2025, 3:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-a-law-rant/1013561/14 "2025-01-30T03:45:18Z")
> [@Dinsdale](#):
>
> there are all manner of “laws” that do not require Congressional approval
Ohm’s Law, Murphy’s Law, Cole’s Law…
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### Author:  [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)
#### Post date: [January 30, 2025, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-a-law-rant/1013561/15 "2025-01-30T20:51:45Z")
Katrina Law also didn’t require Congressional approval.
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### Author:  [@muldoonthief](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/muldoonthief)
#### Post date: [January 31, 2025, 3:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-a-law-rant/1013561/16 "2025-01-31T03:04:50Z")
What’s Cole’s Law?
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### Author:  [@El\_Famous\_Burrito](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/El_Famous_Burrito)
#### Post date: [January 31, 2025, 6:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-a-law-rant/1013561/17 "2025-01-31T06:29:08Z")
Our new Goebbels, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt, will surely make this “mistake” zillions of times in the coming months. Here she was two days ago at her inaugural press conference:
> So, what does this pause mean? It means no more funding for **illegal** DEI programs. It means no more funding for…
And so on and so on. These people are going to happily declare anything that goes against Trump’s interoffice memos “illegal.” And his voters will lap it up.
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### Author:  [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)
#### Post date: [January 31, 2025, 7:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-a-law-rant/1013561/18 "2025-01-31T07:27:07Z")
> [@muldoonthief](#):
>
> What’s Cole’s Law?
It’s a chilled salad made with shredded cabbage.
(But that’s not important right now)
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### Author:  [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)
#### Post date: [January 31, 2025, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-a-law-rant/1013561/19 "2025-01-31T16:03:43Z")
> [@kaylasdad99](#):
>
> It’s a chilled salad made with shredded cabbage.
And in Lowell Maximum Security Prison (on the old sketch comedy show _The State_), lawbreakers toil all day smashing cabbage to make coleslaw.
[ ](https://i.imgur.com/oAIPlsB.jpeg)
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### Author:  [@Max\_S](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Max_S)
#### Post date: [February 1, 2025, 5:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-not-a-law-rant/1013561/20 "2025-02-01T17:58:27Z")
> [@El\_Famous\_Burrito](#):
>
> Our new Goebbels, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt, will surely make this “mistake” zillions of times in the coming months. […] These people are going to happily declare anything that goes against Trump’s interoffice memos “illegal.”
The administration’s position is that DEI programs are inherently illegal (allegedly violate equal protection and due process), not due to mistaken belief that an executive order is a law.
However, there are some instances where an executive order can lead to something becoming legal or illegal, such as directing the Attorney General to review the scheduling of a controlled substance (nb. many commonly abused substances are classified by statute or treaty and not subject to the AG’s discretion). But take something like an abortion pill - arguably, the President could issue an executive order that leads to it becoming a controlled substance.
~Max