[Please read, sign, and circulate to colleagues as you see fit. Letter and list of signatories will be released to media on or about February 25. Many thanks.]

[Note: there are currently more than 1000 signatories.]

The undersigned are professors and teachers of law, dedicated to the rule of law. We believe we are in a constitutional crisis.

The President has signed a number of executive orders that are beyond his constitutional or statutory authority. The President cannot change who is a citizen. He does not have unbridled legal authority to stop funds already allocated by Congress, nor can he unilaterally impose new, politically-motivated conditions on government benefits that violate the constitutional rights of the recipient individuals, companies, and institutions. He is not empowered to disband agencies and departments duly created, empowered, and funded by Congress. He is not allowed to give oversight and control over government operations to private individuals unconstrained by law.

The government and laws of the United States are not subject to presidential whim. On the contrary, the President is bound to “take care that the laws be faithfully executed.” And he is bound by oath to “faithfully execute” the office of the president and “preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”

The undersigned have a variety of views on the underlying policies at issue. But we are united in our view that the President has acted unlawfully and unconstitutionally.

The illegality of these actions, even when the illegality has been adjudged in federal courts, does not seem to be deterring the President’s actions. Instead, the President and his administration are openly flirting with disobeying judicial rulings against him. In fact, the President has proclaimed, “He who saves his Country does not violate any Law.”

We are saddened by the fact that we have to explain to the President this fundamental democratic principle, but we do: a president has the obligation to obey the Constitution as well as court orders enjoining his illegal and unconstitutional efforts. The law is not whatever Mr. Trump says it is. He is not king.

In the words of President John F. Kennedy, “Americans are free … to disagree with the law but not to disobey it. For in a government of laws and not of men, no man, however prominent or powerful, … is entitled to defy a court of law.”

We stand in support of democracy and the rule of law. We stand as allies to those individuals and institutions targeted by illegal and unconstitutional coercion. Our democracy can survive, but not without law.

Initial Signatories

Kent Greenfield, Boston College (principal author)

Floyd Abrams, Yale University

Bruce Ackerman, Yale University

Maryam Ahranjani, University of New Mexico

Lee C. Bollinger, Columbia University

Erwin Chemerinsky, University of California

Alan Chen, University of Denver

Andrew Manuel Crespo, Harvard University

William Marshall, University of North Carolina

Aziz Rana, Boston College

Eric Segall, Georgia State University

Bijal Shah, Boston College

Peter Shane, The Ohio State University; New York University

Geoffrey Stone, University of Chicago 

Julie Suk, Fordham University