Welfare reform: Another administration sidestep of Congress

Bill Clinton always had a lawyer’s gift for parsing the meaning of a word. By the time President Clinton announced he’d kept his campaign promise to "end welfare as we know it," most Americans understood that welfare would not really be ending, anytime soon – that their focus should instead be on what Mr. Clinton meant by "as we know it."

The reform Mr. Clinton signed – after it was enacted by a Republican Congress – did indeed help trim America’s welfare rolls, by adding a work requirement. In the four years after reform, welfare case loads dropped by nearly half. Employment surged and child poverty among affected groups plummeted.

But two weeks ago, the Obama administration issued a new directive stating that the traditional Temporary-Assistance-for-Needy-Families (TANF) work requirements can be waived or overridden by a legal device called the section 1115 waiver authority.

In fact, In establishing the new welfare regime, Congress deliberately exempted or shielded nearly all the TANF program from that waiver authority.

"In the past, state bureaucrats have attempted to define activities such as hula dancing, attending Weight Watchers, and bed rest as ‘work’," wrote Robert Rector and Kiki Bradley of the Heritage Foundation on July 12. "These dodges were blocked by the federal work standards. Now that the Obama administration has abolished those standards, we can expect ‘work’ in the TANF program to mean anything but work."

Why the Obama administration would want to see more people on the welfare rolls and even fewer people working is a mystery. Perhaps a case can be made that some states need more flexibility when it comes to federal welfare rules. But if that’s the case, the White House should have pushed for legislation and a public debate. Instead, as has become typical, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius made the change by executive fiat.

In response, House and Senate Republicans have introduced legislation that would block Ms. Sebelius from issuing the work waivers, while rescinding any already issued.

"The Administration’s unprecedented efforts to undo welfare reforms that resulted in higher earnings and employment for low-income Americans cannot be allowed to stand," intoned House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Dave Camp, R-Mich., last week.

"Neither the Obama administration nor any administration should have the power to unilaterally change the law as it sees fit," added Senate Finance Committee Ranking Member Orrin Hatch, R-Utah.

That Congress should have to bother, in effect, "re-enacting" existing legislation to keep the executive from arbitrarily waiving its requirements – requirements that have proved effective both fiscally and in terms of giving back to more Americans the dignity of a job – is ridiculous.

This administration again reveals the cynical attitude that Congress is not a forum where policy changes should be debated in public view, but an inconvenience to be sidestepped by executive fiat, at whim.