Lansdowne Portrait (gift of British Revolution supporter)By Gilbert Stuart
(1) Describe this
painting.
(2) What message is
this painting
sending about the
power of the
President?
(1) Do you agree with
this message?
Aim: Does the President have too much power?
Vocab
Powers of the President
Executive Privilege
Commander in Chief
Figurehead
Essential Questions:
(1) Does the Executive have more power than any other branch of
government? Explain.
(2) Should the President have the level of power that he does?
(3) How does the President exercise the unwritten power to
persuade?
Word Web – Powers of the President
(use the Constitution and your Checks and Balances handout)
Unofficial Powers?
Constitutional Powers of the President
• Can veto laws
• Nominates/appoints high officials (judges and
ambassadors)
• Conducts foreign policy; makes treaties
• Enforces laws and treaties
• Commander in Chief of the military
• Recommends bills to Congress; sets policy
• Reports the state of the Union to Congress
• Pardons
Unwritten Powers of the President
•
•
•
•
Has advisors that are not elected (The Cabinet) *
Figurehead/Diplomat – represents the country
The full extent of executive privilege
Head of his/her political party
*advisors is written in the Constitution – just no details
about how they serve…
Executive Privilege!
The US Constitution allows presidents to invoke
executive privilege when they want to have
frank but confidential discussions with their
closest aids. It's part of the separation of
powers. Executive privilege allows presidents to
solicit candid advice without scrutiny from other
branches of government.
Examples of Executive Privilege In Use
(1) Theodore Roosevelt declined to give to the Senate papers relating to the
antitrust case the administration was developing against U.S. Steel. The
Senate targeted an administration official in the Justice Department and
threatened him with a contempt charge and jail if he refused to turn over
documents. Roosevelt had the documents transferred to the White House,
assumed responsibility for them and stated, "The only way the Senate or the
committee can get those papers now is through my impeachment.”
(2) During the 1950s, President Dwight D. Eisenhower resisted demands by
U.S. senator Joseph McCarthy of Wisconsin and others for testimony and
personnel records of federal officials. Eisenhower insisted, according to
Stephen E. Ambrose (in Eisenhower: Soldier and President, 1991) that "it is
not in the public interest that any... conversations or communications, or any
documents or reproductions" relating to advice from "any executive branch
official whatsoever be disclosed." The administration denied over forty
Congressional requests.
What does this cartoon suggest about the Presidential powers?
President Nixon – above the law?
(3) The New York Times v. United States (1971, Nixon)
The Pentagon Papers were top-secret documents on the Vietnam War.
Daniel Ellsberg, a former Pentagon employee, illegally copied the
Pentagon Papers and leaked them to The New York Times and The
Washington Post, which published excerpts from the documents. The U.S.
government obtained a court order to forbid further publication of the
Pentagon Papers
•1st Amendment – freedom of press
•Executive Privilege and use of prior restraint (stop before act happens).
•Court said the papers did not endanger national security and therefore
were printable.
(4) United States vs. Nixon, 418 US 683 (1974, Pres. Nixon!)
Nixon claimed he did not have to give up Watergate tapes because of
Executive Privilege and security of the nation (Executive Privilege, Article II
of the Constitution)
•Executive privilege could not be used for withholding information from the
courts in criminal cases.
George W. Bush and Executive Privilege
(5) President Bush invoked it when he refused to give
Congress memos written by White House counsel Harriet
Myers, which helped scuttle her nomination to the US
Supreme Court. Executive privilege was also an issue in
the administration's resistance to sharing notes from the
Vice President's Energy Task Force meetings and in their
resistance to share what they knew about Hurricane
Katrina's destructive potential and when.
www.npr.org
- Scott Simon, host – NPR;
Presidents’ influence of the Legislature and law making
Article I, Section 7, Clause 2 Every Bill which shall have passed the House of
Representatives and the Senate, shall, before it becomes a Law, be presented to the
President of the United States; If he approve he shall sign it, but if not he shall
return it, with his Objections to that House in which it shall have originated, who
shall enter the Objections at large on their Journal, and proceed to reconsider it. If
after such Reconsideration two thirds of that House shall agree to pass the Bill, it
shall be sent , together with the Objections, to the other House , by which it shall
likewise be reconsidered, and if approved by two thirds of that House, it shall
become a Law…If any bill shall not be returned by the President within ten Days
(Sundays excepted) after it shall have been presented to him, the Same shall be a
Law, in like Manner as if he had signed it, unless the Congress by their Adjournment
prevent its Return, in which Case it shall not be a Law.
•Pocket Veto - The Constitution grants the President 10 days to review a measure
passed by the Congress. If the President has not signed the bill after 10 days, it
becomes law without his signature. However, if Congress adjourns during the 10day period, the bill does not become law.