The totally real threat of unspecified, vague, things that might someday happen

The late, great state Sen. Bill Raggio used to advise obstreperous senators that once the election was over, the time for political speeches was done and the time for serious legislative work had begun.

That’s some advice he might have given to Attorney General-elect Adam Laxalt, who today announced a new hire in his office in a news release laden with political rhetoric but short on policy specifics.

In naming Lawrence VanDyke as Nevada’s solicitor general (the attorney who actually argues cases before the state Supreme Court and elsewhere on behalf of the state), Laxalt reminded voters of his campaign-trail promise to tangle with the federal government. Here’s part of the release:

“Throughout my campaign, I promised Nevada’s citizens and job-providers that I would fight for them to protect our state from the federal overreach from Washington,” stated Attorney General-Elect Adam Laxalt. “When I am sworn in as our next Attorney General, Nevada will have a premier U.S. Supreme Court appellate attorney defending our state against an unprecedented encroachment on our laws and our Constitution. Lawrence will be an effective advocate on our state’s behalf. He has significant experience fighting for the individual rights and liberties of the citizens he has served. He will put up a strong and capable defense of Nevada’s laws and our Constitution.”

Really? An “unprecedented encroachment on our laws and our Constitution”?

Like what?

I asked that question, and got an emailed response from Robert Uithoven, Laxalt’s top political adviser, which quotes Laxalt referring me to to a Review-Journal story by Laura Myers for specific examples.

The story mentions the potential listing by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service as “endangered” under the federal Endangered Species Act, a move that could put hundreds of thousands of acres of Nevada public lands off limits to development. But that couldn’t possibly be “an unprecedented encroachment on our laws and Constitution,” since a.) it hasn’t happened yet, b.) a species listing is hardly unprecedented in Nevada history and c.) the listing of endangered species is fully consistent with federal law and powers, and there’s no Nevada law or constitutional provision to the contrary.

So, it can’t be the sage grouse that Laxalt is talking about.

The story also noted that Laxalt signed on to a letter from the Republican Attorney Generals Association that objected to President Barack Obama’s November executive order on immigration reform, granting a temporary reprieve from deportation to certain illegal immigrants. But the story also says Laxalt isn’t going to sue over that, although several other states have said they will.

But once again, that’s hardly unprecedented; Obama already saved the so-called DREAMers from deportation with a previous executive order, and since immigration policy is the exclusive province of the federal government, Nevada’s laws and Constitution are not implicated.

So it can’t be immigration that Laxalt is talking about, either. What else?

The story mentions the fact that most of Nevada’s public lands are owned and controlled by the federal government. But Laxalt acknowledges in the piece that the disclaimer clause (which appears in the ordinance section of the state constitution and in Section 4 the 1864 act of Congress that created Nevada as a state) stipulates that the residents of Nevada “…forever disclaim all right and title to the unappropriated public lands lying within said territory, and that the same shall be and remain at the sole and entire disposition of the United States.” Nevada subsequently acted in 1993 to delete the language of the disclaimer clause, but Congress has never acknowledged the state’s action and the language of its 1864 act remains in effect.

Although it’s not mentioned in the story, during the standoff between duly authorized Bureau of Land Management rangers and armed insurrectionists in April near Bunkerville ranch of Cliven Bundy, Laxalt said things in support of Bundy and the rebels, going so far as to call them “ranchers, friends and fellow church-going residents of our state,” as opposed to, say, out-of-state misfits playing solider and facing off with government officers carrying out the lawful orders of a federal court.

But that still couldn’t be what Laxalt was referring to, since Laxalt must by now understand that the BLM officers in question were carrying out the provisions of a federal court order, and that interfering or obstructing them in that duty is a federal crime. Besides, the BLM and Bundy have been feuding for years, so it’s hardly unprecedented.

So it’s not Bundy. What else?

The story refers to the Affordable Care Act, and quotes Laxalt saying that he’d have sued to overturn it. (Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto, whom Laxalt elsewhere in Myers’ story calls a “role model in how she has run the office,” refused the order of then-Gov. Jim Gibbons to sue. Gibbons then engaged a private lawyer, Mark Hutchison, to take on the case pro-bono. (Hutchison later went on to be elected to the state Senate, and this year as lieutenant governor.)

Still, it wouldn’t have mattered: The Affordable Care Act was upheld by a 5-4 court majority in National Federal of Independent Business v. Sebelius. Surely, Laxalt knows that. So that couldn’t be “the unprecedented encroachment on our laws and Constitution.”

Anything else?

Laxalt mentioned the proposed nuclear waste dump at Yucca Mountain as another issue, and says he’s opposed to it and would fight it in court. But again, that’s hardly unprecedented; the dump fight has been going on since the mid-1980s, when then-President Ronald Reagan signed it into law. (If only Laxalt’s grandfather, former Gov. Paul Laxalt, a good friend of Reagan’s, could have convinced the Gipper not to screw Nevada!)

Finally, the story mentions the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals’ October ruling that invalidated Nevada’s constitutional amendment and statutory provisions that bans gay marriage.

Now here — at last! — we have the federal government (albeit the judicial branch, not the executive) encroaching on our laws and Constitution! Will this be the battle that Laxalt undertakes on behalf of Nevada?

Um, no. According to Myers piece, “Laxalt said that whatever the outcome is, he will defend Nevada law — even if gay marriage is ultimately ruled legal and an equal right.

“’For me, it’s all about the rule of law,’ Laxalt said. ‘I want to make that a hallmark of our term and make sure we stand for a nonpartisan way of doing things and for the rule of law, whether I agree with the outcome or not. For me, it’s (the job) to defend the law.’”

So, by Laxalt’s own admission, the gay marriage ruling doesn’t count as an “unprecedented encroachment on our laws and Constitution.”

Ultimately, it seems the only thing that’s really unprecedented here is the rhetoric about unprecedented encroachments on our laws and Constitution, but precious few actual encroachments on our laws and Constitution.

NEW SOLICITOR GENERAL

In the meantime, VanDyke said in Laxalt’s statement that he’ll defend Nevada against “an ever-increasing, burdensome and expensive federal government.” The text:

“I am honored that Attorney General-Elect Laxalt has placed his confidence in me to represent Nevada’s citizens,” Lawrence VanDyke stated. “Nevada, like many western states, has to deal with the strains, difficulties and costs of an ever-increasing, burdensome and expensive federal government. The citizens of Nevada deserve an advocate and I look forward to working with Attorney General-Elect Laxalt to be serve in that important capacity.”

Again, it’s not immediately clear what VanDyke can do to reduce the costs of an ever-increasing, burdensome and expensive federal government, since no examples were cited.

VanDyke appears to have a fairly impressive resume: He graduated from Harvard Law School in 2005, where he was editor of the law review, and thereafter worked for the powerhouse firm of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher in the appellate and constitutional practice group. After that, he served as an assistant solicitor general for Texas, and then the solicitor general of Montana.

Then again, political commentator Jon Ralston today reported VanDyke was once affiliated with a group that seeks to create a network of Christian lawyers in America, graduates of which will have “…caught a vision for how God can use them as judges, law professors, and practicing attorneys to help keep the door open for the spread of the Gospel in America.”

Technically, it must be said, judges take an oath to “…administer justice without respect to persons, and do equal right to the poor and to the rich, and that I will faithfully and impartially discharge and perform all the duties incumbent upon me as [judicial office] under the Constitution and laws of the United States. So help me God.”

There’s nothing in there about spreading the Gospel, which is more a vocation for preachers, missionaries and individual Christians, rather than judges, law professors or attorneys.

Under Nevada Supreme Court rules, VanDyke can practice in Nevada under a certification from the State Bar, without having to take the state’s bar exam. The certification can be renewed, but VanDyke would be limited to practice for the AG’s office exclusively. However, Laxalt said via email that VanDyke will take the state bar exam in July, the next time the test is offered.