What's happening to Bush

has been going on for a millennium

in the political tradition which formed America

Rulers reach for more and more power

until their parliaments and barons

think things have gone far enough

and begin clipping regal wings

The dark prince, Dick Cheney, mutters repeatedly

that the president is all powerful,

and that Congress should have little to say about war

If Cheney has one overarching mission in life,

it is to restore the authority of the executive

which he saw Congress whittle away in the 1970s

after the debacle of the Nixon administration

- the "imperial presidency," as critics called it

Listening to Bush's petulant tones lambasting Congress for questioning his war, I had a feeling that what we are seeing in Washington has been going on for close to a thousand years in the political tradition in which America was formed.

Rulers reach for more and more power until their parliaments and barons think things have gone far enough and begin clipping regal wings.

This has not been a good spring for the president.

Democrats, and even some Republicans, are beginning to think about choking off the war in Iraq; the Supreme Court didn't like his closing down environmental regulations; his Justice Department is under scrutiny as never before for conducting politically motivated purges.

The dark prince, Vice President Dick Cheney, mutters repeatedly that the president is all powerful, and that Congress should have little to say about war.

One couldn't help but think of the peevishness of King John in 13th-century England, beset with troubles at home and mismanaged wars abroad, desperately unpopular, a king who suffered in comparison to both his father, Henry II, and his brother, Richard I. John also had a strong and much admired mother, Eleanor of Aquitaine.

John is best remembered for his confrontation with his rebellious barons who had simply had enough of his high-handed ways -- leading to the king's capitulation at Runnymede, outside London, and the signing of the Magna Carta in 1215, which curtailed some of the king's powers, and enhanced those of the barons.

The barons had many grievances, but if there was an immediate incitement it was John's efforts to obtain men and money for a lost war across the channel which stirred resentment.

His efforts to collect scutage (shield money) to pay for war was the last straw. And, as my encyclopedia puts it, an accompanying "collapse of the judicial administration must have done more than anything else to bring the masses of men over to the baronial side."

In short, the rebellious barons grew sick of the king's abuse of power and decided to do something about it. Harry of Nevada and Nancy of San Francisco had their counterparts in the 13th-century earls of England.

Later, in the 17th century, King James grew Cheney-like in his devotion to a strong executive.

His book, "The True Law of Free Monarchy," spelled out how the monarch should be unfettered by parliaments, laws, and customs, to look after his people's welfare as he saw fit. As would Bush 400 years later, James believed he drew his authority from God.

Parliament neither liked nor trusted James or his son, Charles, and refused to grant them the revenue they demanded. The contretemps ended in civil war and the execution of Charles I.

Power swung back to the executive with the restoration and Charles II, but it was short-lived. His successor, James II, was forced out.

Parliament offered the throne to William and Mary in 1688, but not without stipulating that no taxes could be levied or armies raised without Parliament's permission.

Nor could people be arrested and detained without due legal process -- a rule that has been somewhat bent by the Bush-Cheney administration in Guantanamo.

Ideas of freedom, liberty, and a suspicion of too much executive power traveled across the Atlantic to the British colonies of North America.

According to writer Kevin Phillips, half the graduates of Harvard College went back to England to fight on the parliamentary side of the English civil war. When it came time to resist the imperial overreach of George III in the 18th century, the colonists were not found wanting.

Much of the discussion by the "founding fathers" of the United States had to do with checks and balances on power, and how to ensure that the divine right of kings was not continued under the guise of divine rights for presidents.

Nor was Parliament or the courts to have absolute power.

If Cheney has one overarching mission in life, it is to restore the authority of the executive which he saw Congress whittle away in the 1970s after the debacle of the Nixon administration -- the "imperial presidency," as critics called it.

There were no recording devices in the 13th century, but I can imagine that the aggrieved tone of King John before Runnymede was similar to what I hear in George Bush's voice as he complains about his parliament and its presumptions. H.D.S. Greenway @ OTR