The
President of the United States is the head of state and head of government of the United States
and is the
highest political official in the United States by influence and
recognition. The president leads the
executive branch of the
federal government
and is one of only two nationally elected federal officers (the
other being the
vice
president of the United States).
Among other powers and responsibilities,
Article II of the
U.S. Constitution
charges the president to "faithfully execute" federal law, makes
the president
commander-in-chief of the
United States armed
forces, allows the president to nominate executive and judicial
officers with the
advice and
consent of the
Senate, and
allows the president to grant
pardons and
reprieves. Due to the United States' status as the only
remaining
superpower, the president of
the United States is generally regarded as the
most powerful person in the
world.
The president is
indirectly
elected by the people through the
Electoral College to a
four-year term. Since 1951, presidents have been limited to two
terms by the
Twenty-second
Amendment.
Forty-three
individuals have been elected or succeeded to the office,
serving a total of fifty-six four-year terms. On January 20, 2009,
Barack Obama became the
forty-fourth, and current,
president.
Origin
In 1783, the
Treaty of Paris
left the United States independent and at peace, but with an
unsettled governmental structure. The
Second Continental Congress had
drawn up the
Articles of
Confederation in 1777, describing a permanent confederation,
but granting to the Congress—the only federal institution—little
power to finance itself or to ensure that its resolutions were
enforced. In part, this reflected the anti-
monarchy view of the Revolutionary period, and the
new American system was explicitly designed to prevent the rise of
an American tyrant.
However, during the
economic
depression due to the collapse of the
continental dollar following the
American Revolution, the
viability of the American government was threatened by political
unrest in several states, efforts by debtors to use popular
government to erase their debts, and the apparent inability of the
Continental Congress to redeem
the public
obligations incurred during
the war. The Congress also appeared unable to become a forum for
productive cooperation among the States encouraging commerce and
economic development. In response a
Constitutional Convention was
convened, ostensibly to reform the Articles of Confederation, but
that subsequently began to draft a new system of government that
would include greater executive power while retaining the checks
and balances thought to be essential restraints on any imperial
tendency in the office of the president.
Individuals who presided over the Continental Congress during the
Revolutionary period and under the Articles of Confederation had
the title "
President of the United
States in Congress Assembled," often shortened to "President of
the United States". The office had little distinct executive power.
With the 1788 ratification of the Constitution, a separate
executive branch was created, headed by the president of the United
States.
A president's executive authority under the Constitution, tempered
by the checks and balances of the judicial and legislative branches
of the federal government, was designed to solve several political
problems faced by the young nation and to anticipate future
challenges, while still preventing the rise of an autocrat.
Powers and duties
Article I legislative role
The first power conferred upon the president by the
U.S. Constitution is the legislative
power of the presidential veto. The
Presentment Clause requires any bill
passed by
Congress to be
presented to the president before it can become law. Once the
legislation has been presented, the president has three options:
- Sign the legislation; the bill then becomes law.
- Veto the legislation and return it to Congress, expressing any
objections; the bill does not become law, unless each House of
Congress votes to override the veto by a two-thirds vote.
- Take no action. In this instance, the president neither signs
nor vetoes the legislation. After 10 days, not counting Sundays,
two possible outcomes emerge:
- If Congress is still convened, the bill becomes law.
- If Congress has adjourned, thus preventing the return of the
legislation, the bill does not become law. This latter outcome is
known as the pocket veto.
In 1996, Congress attempted to alter the president's veto power
with the
Line Item Veto
Act. The legislation empowered the president to sign any
spending bill into law while simultaneously striking certain
spending items within the bill, particularly any new spending, any
amount of discretionary spending, or any new limited tax benefit.
Once a president had stricken the item, Congress could pass that
particular item again. If the president then vetoed the new
legislation, Congress could override the veto by its ordinary
means, a two-thirds vote in both houses. In
Clinton v. City of New York, , the
U.S.
Supreme
Court
ruled such an alteration of the veto power to be
unconstitutional.
Article II executive powers
War and foreign affairs powers
Perhaps the most important of all presidential powers is command of
the
United States armed
forces as
commander-in-chief.
While the power to declare war is constitutionally vested in
Congress, the president commands and directs the military and is
responsible for planning military strategy. The framers of the
Constitution took care to limit the president's powers regarding
the military;
Alexander Hamilton
explains this in
Federalist No.
69: Congress, pursuant to the
War Powers Resolution, must
authorize any troop deployments more than 60 days in length.
Additionally, Congress provides a check to presidential military
power through its control over military spending and
regulation.
Along with the armed forces,
foreign policy is also
directed by the president.
Through the Department of State
and the Department of Defense
, the president is responsible for the protection of
Americans abroad and of foreign nationals in the United
States. The president decides whether to recognize new
nations and new governments, and negotiates treaties with other
nations, which become binding on the United States when approved by
two-thirds of the Senate. The president may also negotiate
"executive agreements" with foreign powers that are not subject to
Senate confirmation.
Administrative powers
The president is the
chief executive
of the United States, putting him at the head of the executive
branch of the government, whose responsibility is to "take care
that the laws be faithfully executed." To carry out this duty, he
is given control of the four million employees of the federal
executive branch.
Various executive branch appointments are made by presidents. Up to
6,000 appointments may be made by an incoming president before he
takes office and 8,000 more may be made while in office.
Ambassadors, members of the
Cabinet, and other federal officers,
are all appointed by a president with the "
advice and consent"
of a majority of the Senate. Appointments made while the Senate is
in recess are temporary and expire at the end of the next session
of the Senate.
The power of a president to fire executive officials has long been
a contentious point of debate. Generally, a president may remove
purely executive officials at his discretion. However, Congress can
curtail and constrain a president's authority to fire commissioners
of independent regulatory agencies and certain inferior executive
officers by statute.
Juridical powers
The
president also has the power to nominate federal judges, including
members of the United
States courts of appeals and the Supreme Court of the United
States
. However, these nominations do require
Senate confirmation and this can provide a major stumbling block
for presidents who wish to shape their federal judiciary in a
particular ideological stance. The president must appoint judges
for the
United States
district courts, but he will often defer to
Senatorial courtesy in making these
choices. He may also grant
pardons and
reprieves, as is often done just before the end of a presidential
term.
Executive privilege gives a
president the ability to withhold information from the public,
Congress, and the courts in matters of national security.
George Washington first claimed privilege
when Congress requested to see Chief Justice John Jay's notes from an unpopular treaty
negotiation with Great Britain
.
While not enshrined in the Constitution, or any other law,
Washington's action created the precedent for the privilege. When
Richard Nixon tried to use executive
privilege as a reason for not turning over subpoenaed evidence to
Congress during the
Watergate
scandal, the Supreme Court ruled in
United States v. Nixon, , that executive
privilege did not apply in cases where a president was attempting
to avoid criminal prosecution. When President
Bill Clinton attempted to use executive
privilege regarding the
Lewinsky
scandal, the Supreme Court ruled in
Clinton v. Jones, , that the privilege also could
not be used in civil suits. These cases established the
legal precedent that executive privilege is valid,
the exact extent of the privilege has yet to be clearly
defined.
Legislative facilitator
While the president cannot directly introduce legislation, he can
play an important role in shaping it, especially if a president's
political party has a majority in one or both houses of the
Congress. While members of the executive branch are prohibited from
simultaneously holding seats in the Congress, they often write
legislation and allow a Senator or Representative to introduce it
for them. The president can further influence the legislative
branch through the constitutionally mandated annual report to
Congress, which may be either written or oral, but in modern times
is the
State of the Union
address, which often outlines a president's legislative
proposals for the coming year.
Pursuant to
Article II, Section 3, Clause 2 of the Constitution, the
president may convene either or both houses of the Congress.
Conversely, if both houses fail to agree on a date of adjournment,
the president may appoint a date for the Congress to adjourn.
Selection process
Eligibility
Article
II, Section 1, Clause 5 of the
Constitution sets the principal
qualifications one must meet to be eligible to the office of
president. A president must:
A person who meets the above qualifications is still disqualified
from holding the office of president under any of the following
conditions:
- Under the Twenty-second
Amendment, no eligible person can be elected president more
than twice. The Twenty-second Amendment also specifies that if any
eligible person who serves as president or acting president for
more than two years of a term for which some other eligible person
was elected president, then the former can only be elected
president once. Scholars disagree whether anyone no longer eligible
to be elected president could be elected vice president, pursuant
to the qualifications set out under the Twelfth
Amendment.
- Under
Article I, Section 3, Clause 7, the Senate has the option, upon conviction,
of disqualifying convicted individuals from holding other federal
offices, including the Presidency.
- Under
Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment, the Constitution
prohibits an otherwise eligible person from becoming president if
that person swore an oath to support the Constitution, and later
rebelled against the United States. However, the Congress, by a
two-thirds vote of each house, can remove the
disqualification.
Campaigns and nomination
The modern presidential campaign begins before the
primary elections, which
the two major political parties use to clear the field of
candidates in advance of their
national
nominating conventions, where the most successful candidate is
made the party's nominee for president. Typically, the party's
presidential candidate chooses a vice presidential nominee, and
this choice is rubber-stamped by the convention.
Nominees participate in
nationally televised
debates, and while the debates are usually restricted to the
Democratic and
Republican
nominees, third party candidates may be invited, such as
Ross Perot in the 1992 debates. Nominees campaign
across the country to explain their views, convince voters and
solicit contributions. Much of the modern electoral process is
concerned with winning
swing states
through frequent visits and
mass media
advertising drives.
Election and oath
Presidents are elected
indirectly
in the United States. A number of electors, collectively known as
the
Electoral
College, officially select the president.
On Election Day, voters in each of
the states and the District of
Columbia
cast ballots for these electors. Each state is allocated a
number of electors, equal to the size of its delegation in both
Houses of Congress combined. Generally, the ticket that wins the
most votes in a state wins all of that state's electoral votes and
thus has its slate of electors chosen to vote in the Electoral
College.
The winning slate of electors meet at its state's capital on the
first Monday after the second Wednesday in December, about six
weeks after the election, to vote. They then send a record of that
vote to Congress. The vote of the electors is opened by the sitting
vice president, acting in his capacity as
President of the
Senate and read aloud to a
joint session of
the incoming congress, which was elected at the same time as the
president.
Pursuant to the
Twentieth
Amendment, the president's term of office begins at noon on
January 20 of the year following the election. This date, known as
Inauguration
Day, marks the beginning of the four-year terms of both the
president and the
vice president. Before
executing the powers of the office, a president is constitutionally
required to take the
presidential
oath:
Although not required, presidents have traditionally used a
Bible to take oath of office and suffixed "So
help me God!" to the end of the oath. Further, though no law
requires that the oath of office be administered by any specific
person, presidents are traditionally sworn in by the
Chief Justice of the United
States.
Tenure and term limits
The term of office for president and vice president is four years.
George Washington, the first president, set an unofficial precedent
of serving only two terms, which subsequent presidents followed
until 1940. Before
Franklin D.
Roosevelt, attempts at a third
term were encouraged by supporters of
Ulysses S. Grant and
Theodore Roosevelt; neither of these
attempts succeeded, however. In 1940, Franklin Roosevelt declined
to seek a third term, but allowed his political party to "
draft" him as their presidential candidate
and was subsequently elected to a third term. In 1941, the U.S.
became involved in
World War II, which
later led voters to elect Roosevelt to a fourth term in 1944.
After the war, and in response to Roosevelt's shattering of
precedent, the
Twenty-second
Amendment was ratified, barring anyone from being elected
president more than twice, or once if that person served more than
half of another president's term.
Harry
S. Truman, who was president
when the amendment was adopted, and so by the amendment's
provisions exempt from its limitation, also briefly sought a third
(a second full) term before withdrawing from the
1952
election.
Since the amendment's ratification, four presidents have served two
full terms:
Dwight D. Eisenhower,
Ronald Reagan,
Bill
Clinton and
George W. Bush.
Jimmy
Carter and
George H. W. Bush
sought a second term, but were defeated.
Richard Nixon was elected to a second term,
but resigned before completing it.
Lyndon B. Johnson
was the only president under the amendment to be eligible to serve
more than two terms in total, having served for only fourteen
months following John F. Kennedy's
assassination
. However, Johnson
withdrew from the 1968 Democratic Primary, surprising many
Americans by stating
'I
shall not seek, and I will not accept, the nomination of my party
for another term as your president'.
Gerald Ford sought a full term, after serving
out the last two years and five months of Nixon's second term, but
was not elected.
Vacancy or disability
Vacancies in the office of president may arise under several
possible circumstances: death, resignation and
removal from
office.
Article II, Section 4 of the Constitution allows the House of
Representatives to impeach high federal officials, including the
president, for "treason, bribery, or other high crimes and
misdemeanors."
Article I, Section 3, Clause 6 gives the Senate the power to
remove impeached officials from office, given a two-thirds vote to
convict. Two presidents have thus far been impeached by the House,
Andrew Johnson in 1868 and
Bill Clinton in 1998. Neither was subsequently
convicted by the Senate; however, Johnson was acquitted by just one
vote.
Under Section 3 of the Twenty-fifth Amendment, the president may
transfer the presidential powers and duties to the vice president,
who then becomes
acting president, by
transmitting a statement to the
Speaker of
the House and the
president
pro tempore of the Senate stating the reasons for the
transfer. The president resumes the discharge of the presidential
powers and duties when he transmits, to those two officials, a
written declaration stating that resumption. This transfer of power
may occur for any reason the president considers appropriate; in
2002 and again in 2007, President
George
W. Bush briefly transferred
presidential authority to Vice President
Dick Cheney. In both cases, this was done to
accommodate a medical procedure which required Bush to be sedated;
Bush returned to duty later the same day.
Under Section 4 of the Twenty-fifth Amendment, the vice president
and a majority of the
Cabinet
may transfer the presidential powers and duties from the president
to the vice president once they transmit to the Speaker of the
House and the president
pro tempore of the Senate a
statement declaring the president's incapacity to discharge the
presidential powers and duties. If this occurs, then the vice
president will assume the presidential powers and duties as acting
president; however, the president can declare that no such
inability exists and resume the discharge of the presidential
powers and duties. If the vice president and cabinet contest this
claim, it is up to Congress, which must meet within two days if not
already in session, to decide the merit of the claim.
The United States Constitution mentions the resignation of the
president but does not regulate the form of such a resignation or
the conditions for its validity. By Act of Congress, the only valid
evidence of the president's decision to resign is a written
instrument declaring the resignation signed by the president and
delivered to the office of the
Secretary of State. On
August 9, 1974, facing likely impeachment in the midst of the
Watergate scandal,
Richard Nixon became the only president ever
to resign from office. Just before his resignation, the
House Judiciary
Committee had reported favorably on articles of impeachment
against him.
The Constitution states that the vice president becomes president
upon the removal from office, death or resignation of the preceding
president. If the offices of president and vice president both are
either vacant or have a disabled holder of that office, the next
officer in the presidential line of succession, the Speaker of the
House, becomes acting president. The line extends to the president
pro tempore of the Senate after the speaker, followed by every
member of the cabinet in a set order.
Compensation
Presidential pay history
Date established |
Salary |
Salary in 2009dollars |
September 24, 1789 |
$25,000 |
$566,000 |
March 3, 1873 |
$50,000 |
$865,000 |
March 4, 1909 |
$75,000 |
$1,714,000 |
January 19, 1949 |
$100,000 |
$906,000 |
January 20, 1969 |
$200,000 |
$1,175,000 |
January 20, 2001 |
$400,000 |
$487,000 |
Sources: |
The president earns a $400,000 annual salary, along with a $50,000
annual expense account, a $100,000 non-taxable travel account and
$19,000 for entertainment. The most recent raise in salary was
approved by Congress and President
Bill
Clinton in 1999 and went into effect in 2001.
The
White House
in Washington, D.C.
serves as
the official place of residence for the president; he is entitled
to use its staff and facilities, including medical care,
recreation, housekeeping, and security services.
Naval
Support Facility Thurmont, popularly known as Camp
David
, is a
mountain based military camp in Frederick County, Maryland used as
a country retreat and for high alert protection of the president
and his guests. Blair
House
, located
adjacent to the Old Executive Office
Building
at the White House Complex and Lafayette Park, is a complex of
four connected townhouses exceeding 70,000 square feet of floor
space which serves as the president's official guest house and as a
secondary residence for the president if needed.
For ground travel, the president uses the
presidential state
car, which is an armored
limousine
built on a heavily modified
Cadillac-based
chassis. One of two identical
Boeing VC-25 aircraft, which are extensively
modified versions of
Boeing 747-200B
airliners, serve as long distance travel for the president, and are
referred to as
Air Force One
while the president is on board. The president also uses a
United States Marine Corps
helicopter, designated
Marine
One when the president is aboard.
The
United States Secret
Service is charged with protecting the sitting president and
his family. As part of their protection, presidents,
first ladies, their children
and other immediate family members, and other prominent persons and
locations are assigned
Secret
Service codenames. The use of such names was originally for
security purposes and dates to a time when sensitive electronic
communications were not routinely encrypted; today, the names
simply serve for purposes of brevity, clarity and tradition.
File:WhiteHouseSouthFacade.JPG|The White House
File:Camp David.jpg|Camp
David
File:Blair House daylight.jpg|Blair House
File:GPA02-09 US SecretService press release
2009 Limousine Page 3 Image.jpg|
Presidential State
CarFile:Air Force One over Mt. Rushmore.jpg|
Air Force OneFile:Marine One
(1970).jpg|
Marine One
Post-presidency
Beginning in 1959, all living former presidents were granted a
pension, an office and a staff. The pension has increased numerous
times with Congressional approval. Retired presidents now receive a
pension based on the salary of the current administration's cabinet
secretaries, which is $191,300 as of 2008. Some former presidents
have also collected
congressional
pensions. The
Former
Presidents Act, as amended, also provides former presidents
with travel funds and
franking
privileges.
Until 1997, all former presidents, and their families, were
protected by the Secret Service until the president's death. The
last president to have lifetime Secret Service protection is
Bill Clinton; George W. Bush and all
subsequent presidents will be protected by the Secret Service for a
maximum of ten years after leaving office.
Some presidents have had significant careers after leaving office.
Prominent examples include
William
Howard Taft's tenure as
Chief Justice of the United
States and
Herbert Hoover's work
on government reorganization after
World
War II.
Grover Cleveland, whose
bid for reelection failed in 1888, was elected president again four
years later in 1892. Two former presidents served in Congress after
leaving the White House;
John Quincy
Adams was elected to the
House of
Representatives, serving there for seventeen years, and
Andrew Johnson returned to the Senate
in 1875.
John Tyler served in the
provisional
Congress
of the Confederate States during the
Civil War and was elected to the
Confederate House of Representatives, but died before it convened.
More recently,
Richard Nixon made
multiple foreign trips to countries including China and Russia, and
was lauded as an elder statesman.
Jimmy
Carter has become a global
human
rights campaigner, international arbiter and election monitor,
and a recipient of the
Nobel Peace
Prize.
Bill Clinton has
taken on some work as an 'elder
statesman', most notable for his involvement in the
negotiations that led to the release of two American Journalists, Laura Ling
and Euna Lee from North
Korea
. Bill
Clinton has also been active politically since his presidential
term ended, working with his wife,
Hillary Clinton on her
presidential
bid.
Currently there are four living former presidents:File:Jimmy Carter
Crop.jpg|
Jimmy Carter (D), served
1977-1981File:George H. W. Bush, President of the United States,
1989 official portrait cropped.jpg|
George H. W. Bush
(R), served 1989-1993File:Bill Clinton.jpg|
Bill Clinton (D), served
1993-2001File:George-W-Bush.jpeg|
George
W. Bush (R), served
2001-2009
Presidential libraries
Each president since
Herbert Hoover
has created a repository known as a
presidential library for preserving and
making available his papers, records and other documents and
materials.
Completed libraries are deeded to and
maintained by the National Archives and
Records Administration
(NARA); the
initial funding for building and equipping each library must come
from private, non-federal sources. There are currently
thirteen presidential libraries in the NARA system.
There are also a
number of presidential libraries maintained by state governments
and private foundations, such as the Abraham Lincoln
Presidential Library and Museum
, which is
run by the State of Illinois
.
Criticism of the presidency
During America's history, there has been criticism not only of
particular presidents and their policies, but of the presidency
itself. Each of these criticisms generally fall into one of the
following categories:
- Presidency is too powerful. Most of the
nation's Framers expected
Congress, which was described
first in the Constitution, to be the dominant
branch of government; they did not want or expect a strong
executive. However, numerous critics describe the presidency today
as too powerful, unchecked and unbalanced and "monarchist" in
nature. Critic Dana D. Nelson believes presidents over the past
thirty years have worked towards "undivided presidential control of
the executive branch and its agencies." She criticizes proponents
of the unitary executive for
expanding "the many existing uncheckable executive powers -- such
as executive orders, decrees, memorandums, proclamations, national
security directives and legislative signing statements -- that
already allow presidents to enact a good deal of foreign and
domestic policy without aid, interference or consent from
Congress." Constitutional scholars have criticized excessive
presidential power and described
presidents as "constitutional dictators" with "an incentive to
declare emergencies" to assume "quasi-dictatorial powers."
David Sirota sees a pattern which "aims to
provide a jurisprudential rationale for total White House
supremacy
over all government." Another critic wrote that the expanded
presidency was "the greatest threat ever to individual freedom and
democratic rule."
- Images and public relations. Some argue that
images of the presidency have a tendency to be manipulated by
administration public relations
officials as well as by presidents themselves. One critic described
the presidency as "propagandized leadership" which has a
"mesmerizing power surrounding the office"; another described the
aura surrounding the presidency with the word "cult."
Administration public relations
managers staged carefully-crafted photo-ops
of smiling presidents with smiling crowds for television cameras;
in one instance of a televised photo-op,
viewers were influenced by images and not by the story. One critic
wrote the image of John F. Kennedy
was described as carefully framed "in rich detail" which "drew on
the power of myth" regarding the incident of PT
109 and claimed that Kennedy understood how to use images to
further his presidential ambitions. Even presidential funerals are
staged affairs with high production values to give an impression of
"regal grandeur". As a result, Americans have unrealistic
expectations of presidents, who are expected to "drive the economy,
vanquish enemies, lead the free world, comfort tornado victims,
heal the national soul and protect borrowers from hidden
credit-card fees."
- Expansion of the federal government.
Presidents from both parties have been
criticized for enlarging the federal government
to the detriment of state governments.
Most presidents expanded the federal government, although there
have been some exceptions (see table). The largest expansion,
arguably, happened during FDR's New Deal
as a way of coping with the Depression, but after the Depression ended,
government didn't shrink back to a smaller size. Today, the federal
government has numerous agencies and powers and employs two million
people.
Expansion of federal government since 1949
|
Years |
President |
Party |
Growth |
Notes |
1949-52 |
Truman |
Democrat |
|
|
1953-57 |
Eisenhower |
Republican |
|
|
1957-60 |
Eisenhower |
Republican |
|
|
1961-64 |
Kennedy-Johnson |
Democrat |
|
|
1965-68 |
Johnson |
Democrat |
|
|
1969-72 |
Nixon |
Republican |
|
|
1973-76 |
Nixon-Ford |
Republican |
|
|
1977-80 |
Carter |
Democrat |
|
|
1981-84 |
Reagan |
Republican |
|
|
1985-88 |
Reagan |
Republican |
|
|
1989-92 |
GHW Bush |
Republican |
|
|
1993-96 |
Clinton |
Democrat |
|
|
1997-00 |
Clinton |
Democrat |
|
|
2001-04 |
GW Bush |
Republican |
|
|
2005-08 |
GW Bush |
Republican |
|
|
|
Source:
New York Times (2009)
- Deficit spending. Few presidents over the past
hundred years have been adept at keeping spending within limits.
Presidents who promised to rein in spending had difficulty
controlling budgets. In the first decade of 2000, $632 billion was
added to the budget. In 2009, the United
States
has a huge
federal deficit and may be forced to borrow nearly $9.3 trillion
over the next ten years. A critic and senator warned this "clearly creates a
scenario where the country's going to go bankrupt."
- Legislative and budgetary powers. Some critics
charge that presidents have usurped important legislative and
budgetary powers which should normally belong to Congress. Presidents control a vast
array of agencies which can
make regulations with little oversight from Congress. One critic charged
that presidents can appoint a "virtual army of 'czars' -- each
wholly unaccountable to Congress yet tasked with spearheading major
policy efforts for the White
House
".
Presidents have been criticized for making signing statements when signing
congressional legislation about how they understand a bill or plan
to execute it, and commentators have described this practice as
against the spirit of the Constitution. Signing statements
"tip the balance of power between Congress and the White House
a little
more in favor of the executive branch" and have been used by the
past four presidents. This practice has been criticized by
the American Bar
Association as unconstitutional. One critic sees an
"increasingly swollen executive branch" and "the eclipse of
Congress" and said that this process has been continuing "for
decades" and criticized the "marginalization" of Congress.
- Starting wars without a declaration from
Congress. Some critics charge that the executive branch has usurped Congress's
Constitutionally-defined task of declaring war. While historically
presidents initiated the process for going to war, they asked for
and got formal war declarations from Congress for the War of 1812, the Mexican–American War, the
Spanish–American War,
World War I, and World War II, but presidents did not
get official declarations for other military actions, including
Theodore Roosevelt's military
move into Panama
in 1903, the
Korean War, the Vietnam War, the invasions of Grenada
and Panama
(1990).. However, while not getting an official declaration
of war, presidents got Congressional approval in the first Iraq war and second Iraq War In 1993, one critic
wrote "Congress's war power has become the most flagrantly
disregarded provision in the Constitution."
- Election advantages of incumbent presidents.
Presidents, in office, and seeking a second term have an advantage
over challengers, and critics charge that this is unfair. Since
1936, in the thirteen presidential elections where there was an
incumbent, incumbents won ten times, challengers only three times
(see table). Incumbent presidents seeking re-election enjoy
advantages such as an "aura and experience of the office,"
commanding "media coverage," being able to "influence events" and
"dispense government grants." One reporter noted "nearly all
incumbents raise far more (money) than do their challengers" which
brings a huge advantage to incumbents.
PACs give most of their
money to incumbents because they are more likely to win.
Presidential elections since 1936 with one
incumbent
|
Year |
Candidate |
Votes |
Candidate |
Votes |
Winner |
Notes |
1936 |
Roosevelt |
523 |
Landon |
8 |
Incumbent |
|
1940 |
Roosevelt |
449 |
Willkie |
82 |
Incumbent |
|
1944 |
Roosevelt |
432 |
Dewey |
99 |
Incumbent |
|
1948 |
Truman |
303 |
Dewey |
189 |
Incumbent |
|
1956 |
Eisenhower |
457 |
Stevenson |
73 |
Incumbent |
|
1964 |
Johnson |
486 |
Goldwater |
52 |
Incumbent |
|
1972 |
Nixon |
520 |
McGovern |
17 |
Incumbent |
|
1976 |
Carter |
297 |
Ford |
240 |
Challenger |
|
1980 |
Reagan |
489 |
Carter |
49 |
Challenger |
|
1984 |
Reagan |
525 |
Mondale |
13 |
Incumbent |
|
1992 |
Clinton |
370 |
GHW Bush |
168 |
Challenger |
|
1996 |
Clinton |
379 |
Dole |
159 |
Incumbent |
|
2004 |
GW Bush |
286 |
Kerry |
252 |
Incumbent |
|
|
Note: elections with no incumbent and third party candidates were
excluded. Numbers are electoral college votes. For further
information: see
election results.
- Misusing the power to pardon. Presidents have
been criticized for abusing this power. For example, Ford pardoned the person who had earlier chosen
him to be vice president, Nixon;
Ford's decision was criticized as a misuse of the pardon power.
Presidents have been criticized for other pardon decisions as well,
including an official suspected of hiding notes relating to the
Iran-Contra scandal, issuing 140 pardons
on the last day in office, pardoning fugitives and prominent
campaign contributors. A president commuted the sentence of a
staffer who had covered up administration complicity in the
Valerie Plame Wilson
matter.
- Foreign policy management. Since there is no
requirement that presidential candidates have foreign policy or
military or diplomatic expertise, and presidents manage foreign
policy, the quality of decision making has varied from president to
president. Assessments by foreign policy experts list both
successes and failures in the past half century. Important
successes within the last half century included the breakup of the
Soviet
Union and avoiding World War III
as well as the handling of the Cuban missile crisis in 1962.
But
numerous presidential decisions have been criticized, including the
Bay of Pigs
invasion of
Cuba
, specific
military choices, trading arms for hostages with Iran
, and
decisions about initiating wars. The occupation
following the Iraq War was criticized as
being "catastrophically unplanned" and overall strategy with
Iraq
was called a
"self-defeating alienation of allies." One critic noted a
trend of the "militarization of U.S. foreign policy." Presidents have been
accused of supporting dictators such as the Shah of Iran, Musharraf of Pakistan
, and
Marcos of the Philippines
.
Overall
strategy regarding the Middle East has
been criticized as well as the handling of North
Korea
and Iran
.
Critics have charged that partisan
politics have interfered with foreign policy.
See also
References
- Our Government • The Executive Branch, The
White House
- . Grover Cleveland served two non-consecutive
terms and is counted as both the 22nd and the 24th president.
Because of this, all presidents after the 23rd have their official
listing increased by one.
- Shurtleff v. United States, ; Myers v.
United States, .
- Humphrey's Executor v.
United States, and Morrison v. Olson, ,
respectively.
- Foreign-born Americans who were citizens at the time the
Constitution was adopted were also eligible to become president,
provided they met the age and residency requirements. However, this
allowance has since become obsolete.
- See: ; alternatively, see:
- See GPO Annotated U.S. Constitution, 2002 Ed., at
611 & nn.772–73.
- Guardian, " Bush colonoscopy leaves Cheney in charge", July
20, 2007
- Relative Value in US Dollars. Measuring
Worth. Retrieved May 30, 2006.
- Dept. of Labor Inflation Calculator. Inflation
Calculator. Retrieved August 10, 2009.
- "How much does the U.S. president get paid?".
Howstuffworks. Retrieved July 24, 2007.
- Salaries of Federal Officials: A Fact Sheet.
United States Senate website. Retrieved August 6,
2009.
- New Presidential Limousine enters Secret Service
Fleet US Secret Service Press Release (January 14, 2009)
Retrieved on 2009-01-20
- Air Force One. White House Military Office. Retrieved
June 17, 2007.
- Any U.S. Air Force aircraft carrying the
president will use the call sign "Air Force One." Similarly,
"Navy One",
"Army One", and
"Coast Guard
One" are the call signs used if the president is aboard a craft
belonging to these services. "Executive One" becomes the call sign of any
civilian aircraft when the president boards.
- Biography of Richard M. Nixon, The White House
Further reading
- Couch, Ernie. Presidential Trivia. Rutledge Hill
Press. March 1, 1996. ISBN 1-55853-412-1
- Lang, J. Stephen. The Complete Book of Presidential
Trivia. Pelican Publishing. September 2001. ISBN
1-56554-877-9
- Leonard Leo, James Taranto, and William J. Bennett.
Presidential Leadership: Rating the Best and the Worst in the
White House. Simon and Schuster, June, 2004, hardcover, 304
pages, ISBN 0-7432-5433-3
- Presidential Studies Quarterly, published by Blackwell
Synergy, is a quarterly academic journal on the President.
- Waldman, Michael, and George Stephanopoulos. My Fellow
Americans: The Most Important Speeches of America's Presidents,
from George Washington to George W. Bush. Sourcebooks
Trade. September 2003. ISBN 1-4022-0027-7
- Winder, Michael K. Presidents and Prophets: The Story
of America's Presidents and the LDS Church. Covenant
Communications. September 2007. ISBN 1-59811-452-2
External links
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|}
Official
Presidential histories
- A New Nation Votes: American Election Returns,
1787–1825 Presidential Election Returns including town and
county breakdowns.
- A companion website for the C-SPAN television series:
American Presidents: Life Portraits
- A collection of letters, portraits, photos, and other documents
from the National Archives
- A collection of over 67,000 Presidential documents
Miscellaneous