The fear that fascinates the large strip of Americans under Donald Trump’s second administration is unprecedented in modern American history. The president’s act of retaliation against his brave political enemy, open hostility to objections, and ignoring democratic norms reveals that he is trying to garner power with even less restraint than before. There is.
It is appealing to reduce the US political crisis to the simple notion that poor choices at the ballot box will result in bad outcomes.
But the horrifying reality is that constitutional and legal protection measures that have long been assumed to be breakwaters against authoritarian rule have proven to be surprisingly ineffective. That’s because elite privilege and authoritarianism are part of the DNA of the US Constitution.
Inequality and privileges in the US Constitution
Despite the lofty rhetoric of freedom supported by the founder, the constitution they drafted was not about freedom and equality for everyone.
As originally conceived, it is deeply flawed, drafted by an elite class of white male property owners whose main concerns maintain economic and political control. It was a document of slavery. The so-called principles of freedom and democracy were designed to exclude most of the population, including those enslaved, women and the poor.
The US Constitution is not a universal charter of rights, but rather sets out systemic inequality, ensuring that power remains concentrated in the hands of a few privileged people.
It is no coincidence that the United States is behind much of the world in securing fundamental rights. Unlike many democracies in which the Constitution expressly recognizes economic and social rights as the basis of human dignity, the U.S. Constitution does not include such guarantees. There is no constitutional right to healthcare, housing, living wages, or basic economic security. This absence is no coincidence. It reflects the priorities of systems designed to serve economic elites.
In the United States, these protections remain elusive and are dismissed as “radical” by institutions succumbing to the privilege of wealth and power over human happiness. It is not surprising that the US government will not spare the costs of military power, but it refuses to extend the same urgency to civilian socioeconomic security.
Unidentified Executive Power
While not expanding economic and social rights to American citizens, the US Constitution gives the US president as far as they please.
Unlike most democratic leaders, the US president exercises extraordinary, one-sided powers with little judicial or legislative oversight. The president can suspend or pursue federal prosecutions, choose laws, manage immigration policies, classify or declassify government secrets, invalidate agency rules, and cleanse “dishonest” officials. can.
Foreign policy decisions, including withdrawal of treaties and military intervention, require Congressional approval elsewhere, but the US president unilaterally leaves the treaty and uses loopholes in force resolutions without Congressional permission You can deploy an army to do so.
Emergencies where most democracies require legislative surveillance are virtually unchecked in the United States.
In stark contrast to democracy, where courts check that executives are actively enforced, American judiciary consistently protects diplomatic executives, even in the event of serious human rights violations. An outrageous example is the trial of an international defense case for children, International Palestine vs. Biden, which is the Plaintiff’s control of former US President Joe Biden for US support for Israeli military action in Gaza. He argued that American aid promoted the act of genocide.
Despite acknowledging credible evidence, the court dismissed the case and reaffirmed that even cases involving human rights violations remained legally unexplainable.
The president’s call to national security has long been an excuse for an unconfirmed expansion of the executive body. Trump, like President George W. Bush, actively seized this precedent, using it not only to military intervention but also to justify domestic crackdowns. Under the guise of national security, his administration is targeting immigrants and threatening to criminalize opposition.
The absolute nature of the president’s pardon power is also troublesome. Unlike other democracies where management is monitored, the US Constitution does not impose any meaningful restrictions on this authority. Trump has taken this to extremes, giving pardons to political loyalists, war criminals and rebels. In the hands of an authoritarian president, pardons become a tool for undermining justice and integrating power.
The role of the Supreme Court
With or without a constitution, the US Supreme Court, which is in charge of constitutionality, has played a historically important role in entrenching the hegemony, privilege and inequality of white Americans.
Plessyv in 1896. In the Ferguson court case, the court provided constitutional legitimacy to the rigged racial apartheid endured in the 20th century. The legal system did not simply tolerate racial conquest. It was actively supported and forced.
Meanwhile, the Supreme Court routinely defeated attempts to regulate economics, engaging in minimum wage laws, labor protections and antitrust laws on the grounds that such measures violated federalist principles and so-called freedom of contracts. I’ve blocked it. These rulings were not about protecting freedom, but about protecting wealthy elites from democratic accountability.
It was only during the mid-20th century, especially under the Warren Court, that judiciary embraced rights-based discourse aimed at expanding civil liberties and protecting marginalized communities. Brownv. Boardof Education (1954), Gideonv. Wainwright (1963), Mirandav. Arizona (1966), Roev. Landmark decisions such as Wade (1973) abolished separate principles, but are equivalent Education has anchored the rights of fair court proceedings and women’s rights to reproductive choices. Among these, among other cases, a shift towards a more comprehensive interpretation of constitutional rights was presented.
However, this period of judicial advancement has proven to be short-lived. The promotion of a conservative majority in the Supreme Court brought the institution back to its original DNA. They support the elite at the disadvantages of women and minorities.
Over the past two decades, courts have systematically dismantled many of the interests of the rights revolution, the unfolding of voting rights, the erosion of reproductive freedom, and the weakening of labor protection.
The impact of money in American politics further strengthens this reality and ensures that government remains seen in the interests of elites rather than voters. The Supreme Court’s decision on citizen unification in 2010 accelerated this decline by legalizing the free flow of corporate funds into political campaigns.
The Supreme Court has also played a key role in expanding the administration. Trump vs. It’s not as clear as the Supreme Court’s 2024 decision in the United States. This effectively exempts a wide range of immunity from criminal prosecution for conduct taken while in office.
The court also granted enforcement of near-free control over law enforcement. In the case of the United States v. Nixon (1974), the court reaffirms that the administrative agency has exclusive rights to the prosecutor’s decision, and what accusations the president and the attorney general will make, whom to prosecute. He emphasized that he has broad discretion to decide what charges to file. Whether to pursue a case.
Similarly, Hecklerv. In Chaney (1985), the court clearly states that an agency’s decision not to enforce laws similar to the prosecutor’s decision not to file charges is not considered to be presumed as it falls within the realm of enforcement discretion. I decided to do so. Together, these cases reinforced the principle that the enforcer has almost absolute discretion in the matter of prosecutors, protected from judicial interference.
Trump made full use of this. He openly declares his intention to investigate and prosecute his political enemy, threatening the fundamental democratic principles of fair justice. In a constitutional democracy, we cannot live in fear of arbitrary government actions. However, the current legal framework is largely unprotected. Even if a targeted individual is acquitted, the financial and emotional sacrifices can be devastating.
A calm reality
Trump is not unusual, but it is a predictable product of a system that privileges the elite, maintains global control and protects the chairman from accountability. The fear that many Americans feel today is guaranteed, but it reflects deeper misunderstandings. This is not a departure from standard, it is a continuation.
The belief that the US Constitution essentially protects against tyranny has always been an illusion. From slavery and the massacre of indigenous peoples to the detention of Japanese-Americans, the red terror, the “war on terror” and the oppression of Palestinians’ Israeli genocide, American history is consistently justified in power. It makes clear that it will win.
The harsh reality is that despite worship in American political culture, the US Constitution is an outdated and inadequate document to address the challenges of the modern world. It was written for a narrow class elite who could not imagine a diverse, industrialized, and connected society. Structural flaws in the constitution – lack of social and economic protection, lifelong reliance on elected judiciary, corrosive money in politics, its deep, undemocratic electoral system is at risk It left an unequipped country to stand up. 21st century.
This is not a fleeting crisis, but the culmination of a constitutional system that is not designed to protect tyranny. The pressing question isn’t whether American democracy is in danger anymore, but what the public needs to face this sobering reality.
The views expressed in this article are the authors themselves and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial stance.