“Over a span of 12 hours, two presidents went on a clemency spree,” Politico reports. “The extraordinary wave of pardons Monday — from Joe Biden as he left the White House and from Donald Trump as soon as he returned to it — demonstrate the potency of the Constitution’s pardon power, but also expose its perils, constitutional scholars say.” “The pardon power — a relic of English monarchs that was adopted by America’s founders as a way to extend grace and mercy in exceptional circumstances — can’t be checked by Congress or the courts.