[United States Statutes at Large, Volume 132, 115th Congress, 2nd Session]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

 
Proclamation 9732 of April 30, 2018

Law Day, U.S.A., 2018

By the President of the United States of America

A Proclamation

On Law Day, we celebrate our Nation's heritage of liberty, justice, and
equality under the law. This heritage is embodied most powerfully in our
Constitution, the longest surviving document of its kind. The
Constitution established a unique structure of government that has
ensured to our country the blessings of liberty through law for nearly
229 years.
The Framers of our Constitution created a government with distinct and
independent branches--the Legislative, the Executive, and the Judicial--
because they recognized the risks of concentrating power in one
authority. As James Madison wrote, ``the accumulation of all powers,
legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands . . . may
justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny.''; By separating
the powers of government into three co-equal branches and giving each
branch certain powers to check the others, the Constitution provides a
framework in which the rule of law has flourished.
The importance of the rule of law can be seen throughout our Nation's
history. This year marks the 150th anniversary of the ratification of
the Fourteenth Amendment to our Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment
prohibits States from denying persons the equal protection of the laws
or depriving them of life, liberty, or property without due process of
law. The commitment to the rule of law that led the country to ratify
that Amendment was no less powerful than the commitment to the rule of
law that led the country to ratify the original Constitution.
That commitment to the rule of law lives on today. It drives the debates
we see around the country about the growth of the administrative state
and regulatory authority, and about the unfortunate trend of district
court rulings that exceed traditional limits on the judicial power.

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We also see that commitment in the people's demand that their
representatives comply with the Constitution, and in the Representatives
and Senators themselves who take seriously their oaths to support and
defend the Constitution of the United States.
President Dwight D. Eisenhower first commemorated Law Day in 1958 to
celebrate our Nation's roots in the principles of liberty and guaranteed
fundamental rights of individual citizens under the law. Law Day
recognizes that we govern ourselves in accordance with the rule of law
rather according to the whims of an elite few or the dictates of
collective will. Through law, we have ensured liberty. We should not,
and do not, take that success for granted. On this 60th annual
observance of Law Day, let us rededicate ourselves to the rule of law as
the best means to secure, as the Preamble to our Constitution so wisely
states, ``the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity.'';
NOW, THEREFORE, I, DONALD J. TRUMP, President of the United States of
America, in accordance with Public Law 87-20, as amended, do hereby
proclaim May 1, 2018, as Law Day, U.S.A. I urge all Americans, including
government officials, to observe this day by reflecting upon the
importance of the rule of law in our Nation and displaying the flag of
the United States in support of this national observance; and I
especially urge the legal profession, the press, and the radio,
television, and media industries to promote and to participate in the
observance of this day.
IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this thirtieth day of
April, in the year of our Lord two thousand eighteen, and of the
Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and forty-
second.
DONALD J. TRUMP