This article first appeared in the June issue of Townhall Magazine.

"You know I taught constitutional law for 10 years, I take the Constitution very seriously,” then-Sen. Barack Obama said while campaigning in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, on March 31, 2008.

“The biggest problems that we’re facing right now have to do with George Bush trying to bring more and more power into the executive branch and not go through Congress at all,” Obama continued, “and that’s what I intend to reverse when I’m president of the United States of America.”

More than six years later, we now know that Obama never had any intention of taking the Constitution seriously. Instead, he has violated its core provisions at every turn, launching unauthorized wars, rewriting legislation without Congress’ input, and even creating brand new laws out of whole cloth.

When Obama first uttered the phrase, “If Congress won’t act, I will,” he functionally declared war on the U.S. Constitution. And unless Republicans start standing up to Obama’s lawlessness, our republic may never be the same.

EMBRACING BUSH’S WAR POWERS

Obama made his 2008 promise to “reverse” Bush’s power grab after a supporter questioned why Obama had voted for reauthorization of the Patriot Act in 2006 after he had promised to vote against the legislation when he was a U.S. Senate candidate in 2003.

In classic Obama fashion, Obama denied all responsibility for his vote. Instead he blamed Bush for issuing executive orders that ignored the limits of existing federal law. Now, six years later, Obama is still presiding over much the same National Security Administration spying program that he once pronounced a “grave threat” to civil liberties, and the Guantanamo Bay detention facility that he said threatened America’s “moral stature in the world,” is also still running strong.



UNAUTHORIZED WAR

Additionally, not only has Obama embraced the war powers he once derided Bush for claiming, but he has expanded them substantially.