By Michael A. Hancock | Commentary, Substack
When the Supreme Court ruled on Friday to restrict the use of nationwide injunctions—limiting the power of lower federal courts to block federal policies across all 50 states—the headlines screamed “judicial power grab.” Civil rights groups warned the ruling is a “crisis for civil liberties”, while pundits cautioned that it is another step in America’s ongoing executive aggrandizement.
The reaction was loud, dire, and—to anyone who understands the Constitution—deeply misleading.
Despite the shrieking headlines and partisan outrage, what we’re witnessing isn’t a constitutional failure. It’s a constitutional function. The system is not broken. It’s working. Slowly, awkwardly, and often frustratingly—but working.
This deliberate slowness, this separation of powers pulling at the seams of power itself, is not evidence of decay. It is the very signature of constitutional government. It is the Founders’ design. The American system was never built for speed or simplicity; it was built for durability and to preserve liberty. And durability, as any architect will tell you, requires counterweights.
That’s what the co-equal branches of government are: counterweights. They exist not to collaborate in cheerful harmony, but to challenge, obstruct, and—when necessary—correct one another. Presidents issue executive orders; Congress sues or withholds funding. Congress passes sweeping legislation; the courts trim it back or strike it down. Courts overreach; constitutional amendments or legislative remedies follow. It’s not chaos. It’s choreography—just not the kind that wins applause from the impatient.
Still, the system’s ability to self-correct has its enemies. Today, the most effective among them wear the mask of the informed critic. These are the propagandists—those who exploit the strength of our constitutional order to erode public faith in it. They spin every moment of institutional tension not as proof of the system’s resilience but as a sign of its collapse. They turn friction into failure, disagreement into dysfunction, and oversight into tyranny.
Let’s be clear: any branch of government can violate the Constitution. Congress can pass laws that exceed its authority. Presidents can test the limits of executive power. Judges can interpret the Constitution into abstraction. But none of these is final. Each branch is restrained by the others. Each is held accountable over time. That is the genius of the design. Not infallibility—but correction.
But to acknowledge that correction takes time—that liberty demands patience—is to admit an uncomfortable truth in an age addicted to immediacy. And that’s where propaganda strikes. It thrives in the space between action and outcome, sowing doubt, suspicion, and despair.
When the courts restrain a president, propagandists cry judicial tyranny. When Congress investigates executive overreach, they call it a witch hunt. When the Court rules against prevailing social winds, it’s labeled undemocratic. Never mind that each of these is an expression of the Constitution doing exactly what it’s supposed to do: dividing power, inviting tension, resisting consolidation.
Propaganda exploits our worst instincts. It tells us that disagreement is defeat, delay is dysfunction, and anything less than immediate satisfaction is a betrayal of democracy. It takes the slow, grinding gears of constitutional governance and reframes them as a sign that the engine has stalled. But the engine hasn’t stalled. It’s government by design, not desire.
There is, to be sure, real dysfunction in Washington. Some politicians abdicate their duties, bureaucrats that expand their reach, and justices who forget that modesty is a virtue. But the measure of a constitutional republic is not whether these things happen—it is whether they are resisted. And in America, they are.
Executive overreach is met with judicial review. Congressional overreach is checked by veto and electoral backlash. Judicial activism is confronted by constitutional amendments or jurisdictional limitations. Over time—slow, imperfect, uneven time—the system pushes back. It recalibrates. It restores.
Yet this very process is now being used against itself. We are told that the presence of tension proves the absence of legitimacy. That an executive order blocked by the courts is evidence of collapse, rather than constraint. That a divided Congress signals chaos, rather than deliberation. That a Supreme Court decision unpopular in some quarters is reason to burn down the institution.
This is not just wrong; it is dangerous.
The greatest threat to constitutional government is not from within the branches of government, but from the erosion of public trust in those branches. When citizens no longer believe in the system’s ability to correct itself, they cease to use its mechanisms. They turn instead to strongmen, to ideologues, or to nihilism. And then, the system truly does break.
Propaganda’s power lies not in its ability to change the Constitution, but in its ability to make people stop believing in it. That is the battlefield we now find ourselves on—not just between left and right, but between confidence and cynicism. Between those who believe the Constitution still works and those who are eager to convince you it doesn’t.
In this moment, it’s worth remembering that the Constitution has survived civil war, economic collapse, foreign attack, and internal upheaval. It was built for tension. It was built for moments like this.
James Madison reminded us that “ambition must be made to counteract ambition.” That insight is the heartbeat of our constitutional design—a recognition that power, unchecked, will always seek more of itself. The system was never meant to run smoothly or swiftly; it was meant to resist consolidation, correct excesses, and preserve liberty through friction. What it demands of us is not blind faith in politicians, but steady trust in a structure that—though flawed and slow—has endured crisis after crisis precisely because it was built for tension. That trust is our civic responsibility. And our safeguard.
So the next time a talking head proclaims the death of the republic because one branch of government dared to check another, smile. Take heart. Because that noise, that friction, that frustration—it’s the sound of the Constitution at work.
And it’s still working.
Hancock also publishes on Substack. You can check out more of his work here.
Michael A. Hancock is a retired high-tech executive, visionary, musician, and composer, exploring diverse interests—from religion and arts to politics and philosophy—offering thoughtful insights on the intersections of culture, innovation, and society.
Editor’s note: Opinions expressed in commentary pieces are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the management of the Rocky Mountain Voice, but even so we support the constitutional right of the author to express those opinions.