Kudos to the American Bar Association for creating a bipartisan “all-star legal panel” to investigate President Bush’s penchant for signing statements that assert his right to ignore more than 750 laws enacted since he took office.

Bush has challenged more laws than every previous president combined.

The blue-ribbon panel includes former officials from the Reagan, Bush Sr., and Nixon administrations. Panel-member William Sessions, who served as FBI Director under Presidents Reagan and Bush, told the Boston Globe that he believes the signing statements raise a “serious problem” for our constitutional system.

“I think it’s very important for the people of the United States to have trust and reliance that the president is not going around the law,” Sessions said.

Now there’s a novel idea for this administration run amok–adherence to the separation of powers, and our system of checks and balances. Among the laws Bush has challenged are the ban on torture, oversight of the Patriot Act, and whistleblower protections.

The panel will make its recommendations to the over 400,000-member ABA this summer. Here’s hoping this bipartisan effort makes some headway in the critical fight to defend our Constitution from those who would treat it as nothing more than a matter of convenience.