Robertson's urging the government to assassinate Chavez

[RJLipkin at aol.com]

I agree in part. My own  view is that we should almost never assassinate a 
foreign leader. We should be  committed instead to an overwhelming presumption 
against doing so. But  I don't think that can be argued for simply by asserting 
that "the one big point  about our form of constitutional government [is] 
that those who run  government must obey the law." The reason it won't work, in 
my view, is because  it assumes an answer to the question "Just what counts as 
obeying the law?" Does  Bush v. Gore?  Brown? An executive impounding 
allocated  funds? And, of course, a host of other decisions and laws. For the most 
part,  appealing to the idea of the rule of law or of obeying the law will not 
succeed  as dispositive against assassination until it is clear that such a law 
exists  explicitly or can be inferred from existing law or constitutional law. 
And if  such a law exists or can be inferred, we don't need the idea of the 
rule of  law to prove the lawlessness of assassination.
 
Bobby
 
Robert Justin  Lipkin
Professor of Law
Widener University School of  Law
Delaware
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