The Logan Act, Republicans, and Treason

The Facts: (any underlines are mine)

-->Text of the Logan Act: 

Any citizen of the United States, wherever he may be, who, without authority of the United States, directly or indirectly commences or carries on any correspondence or intercourse with any foreign government of any officer or agent thereof, in relation to any disputes or controversies with the United States, or to defeat the measures of the United States, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than three years or both.

This section shall not abridge the right of a citizen to apply himself, or his agent, to any foreign government, or the agents thereof, for redress of any injury which he may have sustained from such government or any of its agents or subjects.

--> History:  

• 1799 - The Logan Act was passed under President John Adams.
• 1941 - Former President Herbert Hoover (R) was investigated under the Logan Act for contacting European governments over food relief.  No indictment filed.
• 1968 - Presidential candidate Richard Nixon (R) was investigated for communicating with North Vietnam, asking them to refuse to participate in peace talks with then President Johnson (D).  President Johnson did not want to reveal that the U.S. was intercepting North Vietnamese communications, so no indictment was filed.
• 1975 - Senators John Sparkman (D) and George McGovern (D) were investigated over their travel to Cuba.  An indictment was never filed after it became clear that, though then President Ford (D) had not approved, he had been informed of their travel and the U.S. government had validated the Senators' passports.   
• 1987 - House Speaker James Wright (D) was investigated over his attempt to put himself in the center of ongoing negotiations between Nicaragua and then President Richard Nixon (R).  No indictment filed.

The only known case of an indictment being filed under the Logan Act was an 1803 indictment brought against Kentucky farmer Francis Flournay who wrote a newspaper article advocating that the Western United States join with the French territories in the New World to form a separate nation with ties to France. The finalization of the Louisiana Purchase later that year rendered the indictment moot.

--> The Supreme Court:

In 1936, the Curtiss-Wright Export Corporation brought a suit against the U.S. over
government regulation of business and the supremacy of the executive branch over those regulations after Curtiss-Wright was indicted for selling arms to Bolivia in violation of then President Franklin Roosevelt's (D) embargo on such sales.  They attempted to defend themselves by saying that Congress had improperly delegated legislative power to the White House regarding foreign affairs.  

The Supreme Court ruled that the President of the United States had "plenary" power over foreign affairs and was not dependent upon any congressional delegation.

In that decision, Justice George Sutherland wrote, "The President alone has the power to speak or listen as a representative of the nation.  He makes treaties with the advice and consent of the Senate; but he alone negotiates.  Into the field of negotiation the Senate cannot intrude, the Congress itself is powerless to invade it."  

He further quoted an 1816 Senate Committee on Foreign Relations report on the power given to the executive branch under the Logan Act: "The President is the constitutional representative of the United States with regard to foreign nations."

--> 2015, the Letter:

Freshman Senator Tom Cotton (R-Arkansas) bragged for months of how he hoped to destroy any diplomatic nuclear arms agreement between the U.S. and Iran.  He organized the letter and convinced 46 other Senators to sign the document addressed as an: "Open Letter to the Leaders of the Islamic Republic of Iran."

The letter reads in part:  "It has come to our attention while observing your nuclear negotiations with our government that you may not fully understand our constitutional system...Anything not approved by Congress is a mere executive agreement.  The next president could revoke such an agreement with the stroke of a pen and future Congresses could modify the terms of the agreement at any time...We hope this letter enriches your knowledge of our constitutional system."

--> Signatories:

Tom Cotton -- Orrin Hatch -- Charles Grassley -- Mitch McConnell -- Richard Shelby -- John McCain -- James Inhofe -- Pat Roberts -- Jeff Sessions -- Michael Enzi -- Micahel Crapo -- Lindsey Graham -- John Cornyn -- Richard Burr -- John Thune -- Johnny Isakson -- David Vitter -- John Barasso -- Roger Wicker -- Jim Risch -- Mark Kirk -- Roy Blunt -- Bob Portman -- John Boozman -- Pat Toomey -- John Hoeven -- Marco Rubio -- Ron Johnson -- Rand Paul -- Mike Lee -- Kelly Ayotte -- Dean Heller -- Tim Scott -- Ted Cruz -- Deb Fischer -- Shelley Moore Capito -- Bill Cassidy -- Cory Gardner -- James Lankford -- Steve Daines -- Mike Rounds -- David Perdue -- Thom Tillis -- Joni Ernst -- Ben Sasse -- Dan Sullivan (All are members of the Republican Party.)

I note the number of veteran Senators who hold some degree of leadership and should know better; and the Senators who hold presidential ambitions who haven't taken the time to look forward to how this letter could impact U.S. relations in the Middle East should their ambitions become fact.

--> President Obama's response:

The President had this to say to CNN:  "I think it's somewhat ironic to see some members for Congress wanting to make common cause with the hard-liners in Iran.  It's an unusual coalition,"

--> Iran's Response:

Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif wrote, in part:

"I wish to enlighten the authors that if the next administration revokes any agreement with 'the stroke of a pen,' as they boast, it will have simply committed a blatant violation of international law...I should bring one important point to the attention of the authors and that is, the world is not the United States.  The conduct of inter-state relations is governed by international law and not by U.S. domestic law...The authors may not fully understand that in international law, governments represent the entirety of their respective states, are responsible for the conduct of foreign affairs, are required to fulfill the obligations they undertake with other states and may not invoke their internal law as justification for failure to perform their international obligations."

what eye thynk:  This has got to stop.  

The Republican party continues to hate, to gorge themselves on hate, to fertilize their insatiable lust for power with their seemingly bottomless reservoir of hate.  Each month, each week, each day they raise the stakes. They have become an hysterical mob, deaf to everything but their own screams of hate, hate, HATE! MORE! MORE HATE! YES, MORE!

Their all-encompassing efforts to bring down this President have reached a point of almost erotic frenzy, a cynosure so complete it has left them blind to the fact that their actions are abrogating a democracy they promised to serve and serve honorably. 

The Republican party has allowed their loathing for one man--President Barack Obama, a black man who was twice democratically elected to office by the people of the United States of America--to blind them to the destruction they are effecting.  The GOP's fever-dream of exclusive, conservative power has stood in the way of  anything proposed, suggested, breathed out, dreamed of, imagined, fantasized, envisioned by our President for six years.  Enough is enough.

Despite its 216 year existence, the Logan Act has never been in play--but then
we have never had a Congress like this one.  A Congress with a Republican caucus that refuses to govern in concert with anyone but themselves, a Republican caucus with no caution light, no common sense, no respect.

How long do we allow them to continue to up the stakes?  How long do we continue to allow them to feed before we are all consumed?  How long before our proud democracy collapses under the weight of their hatred?

This week, forty-seven Republican Senators made my country the laughing stock of the Middle East.  When Iran thinks your leaders are a joke, it should be a wake-up call that we have already begun our descent into irrelevance.

Forty-seven Republican Senators--including Majority Leader Mitch McConnell who should have provided the voice of reason but instead chose to join the delinquents--moved beyond in-house irritation and into international obstructionism.  They demonstrated their willingness to connect with a foreign government in order to work against the interests of their own country and a willingness to have their voice heard by the world at large.  How can we call this anything other than treason?

It is time--no, it is past time for the Democratic Party to wake up and fight.

This - must - stop.