South Dakota made a big name for itself this summer for being one of the only states that didn’t fully close during the pandemic. Gov. Kristi Noem had a common-sense approach to her pandemic response where she let her state’s residents make important decisions about their health and their businesses. Gov. Noem not only gave her state’s residents the freedom of choice, but she also opened Mt. Rushmore to President Trump’s 4th of July celebration.
Now the Daily Wire reports that “legislation introduced in the South Dakota House of Representatives seeks to give the state’s attorney general the authority to review executive orders from President Joe Biden and potentially nullify any order deemed unconstitutional.”
The report says that South Dakota state Representative Aaron Aylward (R-Harrisburg) “introduced HB1194, which is described as an act ‘to authorize the review of certain executive orders issued by the President of the United States.”
The House bill seeks to give “the Executive Board of the Legislative Research Council may review any executive order issued by the President of the United States.” It says that if the President signed an order that “has not been affirmed by a vote of the Congress of the United States and signed into law,” the Legislative Research Council must review it.
The review will take place by the board to determine if the President’s Executive Orders violate the Constitutional rights of South Dakota citizens and if found out to be so, the order will then be turned over to the attorney general and the Governor of South Dakota to “be further examined by the attorney general to determine the constitutionality of the order and to determine whether the state should seek an exemption from the application of the order or seek to have the order declared to be an unconstitutional exercise of legislative authority by the President.”
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South Dakota Attorney General Jason Ravsborg would be given the power in this bill to essentially “exempt” the state from any un-Constitutional overreach by the Federal Executive Branch through Executive Orders.
The Bill says that “no state agency, political subdivision, or any elected or appointed official or employee of this state or of a political subdivision may implement an executive order that restricts a person’s rights or that is determined by the attorney general to be unconstitutional.”
HB1194 would flag any order as it pertains to:
- A pandemic or other public health emergency;
- The regulation of natural resources;
- The regulation of the agricultural industry;
- The regulation of land use;
- The regulation of the financial sector through the imposition of environmental, social, or governance standards; or
- The regulation of the constitutional right to keep and bear arms.
Do you think more states will adopt similar bills to nullify executive orders?
The Republican Representative that introduced this bill, Rep. Aylward, told KELO-TV that “this is just a President Biden issue but rather an overall executive overreach issue that we’ve been experiencing for a long time. The U.S Congress has abdicated their duty for a long time in different areas. This bill is simply setting up a process to nullify acts that would be unconstitutional.”
Aylward said, “When looking at the U.S. Constitution, the President only has the powers that are laid out in Article II.” He argues that any Executive Orders that aren’t “affirmed” are not legally enforceable.
He said, for example, “if the President ordered a nationwide mask mandate, it would go against the power laid out in Article II, and it would also go against the protection of the rights that may lie underneath the 9th and 10th amendments.”
Aylward said the bill “would give South Dakota much of its power back.” He argued that “per the supremacy clause of the U.S. Constitution, the powers of the federal government need to line up with what is laid out in the document.”
ARTICLE SOURCE: thefederalistpapers.org
