Four days after Dr. King's death, on April 8, 1968, I introduced a bill that would allow this nation to celebrate the life and work of its greatest civil rights leader with a federal holiday. Though it would take 15 years, from 1968 until 1983, the King Holiday Bill was eventually signed into law through the efforts of friends on the ground and friends in the Congress. Unfortunately, John McCain was not one of those friends.

I wanted to share with all of you the reasoning behind a significant step I have taken in the investigation of the mass firings of federal prosecutors and the politicization occurring within the Department of Justice.

Today, I issued subpoenas to former White House Counsel Harriett Miers to compel her to testify before the House Judiciary Committee and to provide documents related to our investigation.  My counterpart in the Senate, Chairman Leahy, issued separate subpoenas to former Rove assistant, Sara Taylor.

After today’s testimony from Monica Goodling, I think Republicans need to come up with some new talking points on the United States Attorney matter.  They keep saying that
"There’s nothing to this investigation... Democrats are on a fishing expedition... There’s no there there.

That has never been true, but today was a crystallizing moment.  I thought Ms. Goodling was a good and loquacious witness who brought forward some critical information:

The House this week is considering a resolution opposing the President's plan to escalate the conflict in Iraq.

This resolution reflects the will of the American people.  Americans said at the polls last November that they wanted this war to end and for our troops to be withdrawn from the civil war that rages in Iraq.

Now that the President has submitted his budget and the House has begun work on the funding resolutions for fiscal year 2008, Democrats have turned their attention to stopping the president's push for more war.   This week's resolution marks the first step in that process.

Today marks the first hearing I will conduct in the Judiciary Committee since taking over as Chairman and this feels like a momentous occasion.  

Our country has been run, far too long, by an Administration that seeks to rule in secrecy.  The Bush White House has ignored our founding fathers’ separation of powers, claiming an ever increasing scope of authority in direct conflict with the constitution.

For the past six years Congress has been silent, watching idly as its powers are usurped.

No longer.

By last August, I had fulfilled my required obligation (of $200,000 in dues) to the DCCC and then some.  But I agree with Chris Bowers and others that, if ever there was an election that obligates every one of us to do more than what is routine, it is this one.  Therefore, this week, I have donated an additional $100,000 directly to the DCCC and have given more than $14,000 to individual candidates.

A lot of post-hoc analysis is going on today.  Was this an anti-war vote?  Was this a vote against an out-of-touch incumbent?  Was it a vote against the President or those who ally too closely with him?  And what does it mean for November.

Cross Posted at Huffington Post

    Today, I am releasing the final version of my report, the "Constitution in Crisis." The report, which is some 350 pages in length and is supported by more than 1,400 footnotes, compiles the accumulated evidence that the Bush Administration has thumbed its nose at our nation's laws, and the Constitution itself.  Approximately 26 laws and regulations may have been violated by this Administration's misconduct.

    Our Constitution established a tri-partite system of government, with the notion that each branch of government would act as a check on the other two.  Unfortunately, for the last six years, the Republicans in Congress have largely viewed themselves as defenders of the Bush Administration, instead of a vital check on overreaching by the Executive Branch.  By doing so, I believe they have acted to the detriment of our Constitutional form of government.

So imagine our shock when yesterday the very first item listed in their agenda, the so-called "Pledge Protection Act," (an unprecedented court stripping bill that would deny federal courts any ability to consider constitutional questions concerning the Pledge of Allegiance) went down to defeat in the House Judiciary Committee yesterday by a 15-15 vote.  

How this is an issue similar to the net neutrality issue

This is not my usual kind of diary because this is not really a partisan issue, but is an interesting window into the way our laws are made and how some bills are advertised as doing exactly the opposite of what they actually do.  To give you the full picture, I had to go into some depth, so bear with me.

As many of you may know, the House Commerce Committee passed a major telecommunications rewrite that contains a so-called "net neutrality provision" that is little more than a fig leaf for the big telecommunications companies.  The Chairman and I intend to pass our bill out of the Judiciary Committee promptly and fight for its inclusion in the Commerce Committee's bill when the Commerce bill is considered on the House floor.

As the Washington Post reported last month, as the Republican budget bill struggled to make its way through Congress at the end of last year and beginning of this year (the bill cuts critical programs such as student loans and Medicaid funding), the House and Senate passed different versions of it.  House Republicans did not want to make Republicans in marginal districts vote on the bill again, so they simply certified that the Senate bill was the same as the House bill and sent it to the President.  The President, despite warnings that the bill did not represent the consensus of the House and Senate, simply shrugged and signed the bill anyway.  Now, the Administration is implementing it as though it was the law of the land.

    We will be joined by Michael Ratner, the President of the Center for Constitutional Rights; my former House Judiciary colleague who served with me during the impeachment of President Nixon, Liz Holtzman; and John Dean, a renowed legal scholar and former White House counselor to President Nixon.

Many of you are no doubt familiar with the procedure for resolutions of inquiry; however, for those who are not, a brief explanation.  A resolution of inquiry requests information or documents from the Executive Branch. The Committee to which it is referred must vote on it within a specified period of time or the full House must consider it.

As a practical matter, if the Republicans want to dodge an issue, they refer the bill to Committee and then "adversely report" it, which kills it, stopping the request for documents and protecting every non-Committee Republican from having to vote on it.

This is a Huge development.  The fact that millions of Americans will be able to tune in and see House Democrats challenging this program will show that we don't need to simply sit on our hands while the Constitution is shredded.

Cross Posted at Huffington Post and ConyersBlog

Today, I am releasing a staff report entitled, "The Constitution in Crisis: The Downing Street Minutes and Deception, Manipulation, Torture, Retribution and Coverups in the Iraq War."

Before talking about the report, I must express my profound gratitude to the readers of this site, who kept this story alive when no one would cover it, and continued to talk about it after some in the media moved on. Much of the research in this report is a product of the input and hard work of DailyKos, Huffington Post and Conyersblog readers over the last six months (the help with my "timeline project" was particularly useful). I also am so grateful to progressive talk radio hosts and listeners, who have refused to allow the American people to forget the nation was deceived into war.