It’s hard to recall a more delicious constitutional question than whether the Constitution would permit the House of Representatives to deny a seat to the newly elected Republican from Long Island, George Santos, for lying during his campaign. It’s a reminder of what a hard-bitten crew were the Founders who fashioned our national parchment and how determined they were to block the emergence of a king.

It’s not our intention here to defend Mr. Santos for what our constitutional correspondent, A.R. Hoffman, calls his “reams of fabrications.” Vox has a good summary. It says the Times found that Mr. Santos “apparently did not graduate from Baruch College, he did not work for Goldman Sachs or Citigroup, there were no records of him being a successful financier, nor were there of him registering his animal rescue charity.”