"I think Democrats are going to rue the day they did not push back against Obama on these things"

When Obama was unambiguously given waiver powers by No Child Left Behind, he launched the pioneering project of attaching his own conditions before he’d grant waivers. When he had no waiver power at all over the employer mandate, he suspended it anyway. And where previous presidents have suspended deportations and offered work permits to unauthorized immigrants in certain limited circumstances, Obama’s already done so for hundreds of thousands of people, with, apparently, many more to come. Future presidents could cite all of these precedents to justify their own, even more wide-ranging actions.

Howell, the University of Chicago professor, cited one example of how presidents can stretch their powers over time. “The president’s commander in chief powers started off as a limited authority. What we’ve seen over the last 50 or 60 years is presidents interpreting that authority broadly, and getting away with it. As a result, we now say, ‘Of course, the president can do all of these things as commander in chief!’ It may be 50 years hence that we say, ‘Of course, the president can issue waivers as he sees fit.”

The problem for liberals is that there are many laws out there that conservative presidents dearly wish weren’t enforced. Indeed, the precedents Obama is setting “probably benefit conservative presidents who want to stop regulations and have a smaller agenda, to the extent it helps them gain control of the wider executive branch,” says Rudalevige, the Bowdoin professor.

So future Republican presidents will inevitably cite the new precedents Obama is setting to justify actions of their own. “I think Democrats are going to rue the day they did not push back against Obama on these things,” says Sollenberger, the University of Michigan professor. “Just as Republicans regretted the same thing when they didn’t push back against Bush.”