Did the government rescue of the financial system in 2007 and 2008 violate the US constitution or important political norms? A small number of commentators argue that it did. 1 They argue that the government broke the law in several instances; and that, even when it acted with statutory authority, the authority that it relied on was conferred on it by Congress in violation of the constitution. While legal scholars have debated whether certain crisis-response actions violated the law, 2 the bigger argument – that the entire crisis-response system violated fundamental constitutional norms – has received little attention.