Transcript Slide 1

The Presidency
Chapter 6
Prepared by Teresa Nevárez, El Paso Community College
© 2008 Pearson Education, Inc.
Federalist 70 (A. Hamilton)
 Energy in the executive is a leading character in the
definition of good government
 Ingredients which constitute this energy:
– Unity, duration, adequate provisions for its support, due
dependence on the people, and due responsibility
 A single executive is best adapted to deliberation,
wisdom, and conciliation
 Unity will be jeopardized with a plural executive
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Danger of difference of opinion
Lessen the respectability
Weaken the authority
Split the community
Conceal faults and destroy responsibility
Security is unattainable
The Presidency: Focus of Leadership
(C. Rossiter)
 The presidency is a unique concentration of power and
prestige
 There is an extraordinary capacity of the presidency for
strong, able, and popular leadership
– Leader of the Executive Branch: 2.3 million Americans work in
the national administration
– Twin powers of appointment and removal
– Supervises that laws are faithfully executed
– Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy
• In time of war this power swells out of proportion
– Leader in foreign affairs
– Leader of Congress
The Presidency: Focus of Leadership
(C. Rossiter)
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Leader of his party
No. 1 political boss
Leader of public opinion
Spokesman for the real sentiment and purpose of the country
Chief of State: ceremonial head of the government
Leader of the free nations
 The president can only lead us in the direction we are
accustomed to travel
 The presidency is our only truly national political
institution
Presidential Power (R. Neustadt)
 We like to rate our presidents from the moment they take
office
 In form, all presidents are leaders
 Presidents face demands from 5 sources:
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Executive officialdom
Congress
His partisans
From citizens
From abroad
 Constituent relations are relations of dependence
 No man or group shares his status in our government
and politics
Presidential Power (R. Neustadt)
 If ballot-splitting continues, it will soon be un-American for
president and Congress to belong to the same party
 It would be advantageous if the executive and legislative
leadership were linked by party ties
 We are a long way from party government
 Bargaining, not discipline, still remains the key to
congressional action on a president’s behalf
 All presidents after George Washington were party chiefs
 Theoretically, presidents should be able to use their role
as party chief to bridge the constitutional gap created by
the separation of powers
The Presidential Character (J.D. Barber)
 When a citizen votes for a president, he makes a
prediction
 In the face of chaos, citizens usually vote their old
allegiances
 The presidency is an institution made a piece at a time
 The president is a symbolic leader who draws people’s
hopes and fears
 The president is the best-recognized person in the
country who gets the most attention
 The White House is a place of public leadership
The Presidential Character (J.D. Barber)
 Crucial differences in administrations: president’s
character, his world view, and his style
 The president’s personality is an important factor in
understanding his behavior
– Personality is patterned
– It interacts with the power situation he faces
– To best predict a president’s character, world view, and style, one
must look at how they were put together
 The degree and quality of a president’s involvement in an
issue influences how he defines the issue itself
 Style is the president’s habitual way of performing, his
way of acting
The Presidential Character (J.D. Barber)
 World view consists of political relevant beliefs, his way
of seeing
 Character is the way the president orients himself
towards life
 Self-esteem is his prime personal resource
 Popular support is a large factor in a president’s
performance
 People look to a president for reassurance
 Four Types of Presidential Character
– Active-Positive: much activity and enjoyment of it, ex.: Jefferson
– Active-Negative: intense effort and low emotional reward, ex.: J.
Adams
The Presidential Character (J.D. Barber)
– Passive-Positive: life is a search for affection as a reward for
being agreeable and cooperative, ex.: Madison
– Passive-Negative: they are in politics because they think they
ought to be. The tendency is to withdraw and escape from
uncertainty.
 A president is a man with a memory in a system with a
history
Leadership by Definition: Reflections on
George W. Bush (S. Skowronek)
 A president’s leadership posture is related to his personal
character, governing style and the times
 Bush wrote in his 2000 autobiography that he would
never allow himself to be defined by others
 Bush does not say much about himself
 He is not known to be a profound thinker
 Definition has become a central preoccupation for Bush
 He understands leadership as the assertion and control
of definitions
 He believes that effectively asserted definitions can
create their own reality
Leadership by Definition: Reflections on
George W. Bush (S. Skowronek)
 His posture is that of a man of set mind who knows what
to do and leads by doing it
 Definition did not make Bush a purist; it made him a
stalwart
The Presidency and Political Parties
(S.M. Milkis)
 The relationship between the presidency and the
American party system has been difficult
 The Founders established a nonpartisan president
– The president is nominated by a party, but is not elected by it
 The modern presidency was crafted with the intention of
reducing the influence of the party system on American
politics
 New Deal Party Politics
– The New Deal questions the adequacy of traditional natural
rights and limited government responsibility
– It was a commitment to guarantee a decent level of economic
well-being for American people
The Presidency and Political Parties
(S.M. Milkis)
– The new constitutional order would require a more centralized
and administrative government
– The presidency would be a national, executive-oriented system
organized on the basis of public issues
– The New Deal helped the president replace partisan politics with
executive administration
• It extended the merit system
 Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society
– The New Deal established the presidency rather than the party
as the locus of political responsibility
– Johnson accelerated the effort to transcend partisan politics
The Presidency and Political Parties
(S.M. Milkis)
 Nixon and the Demise of the Modern Presidency
– Executive authority was concentrated in the White House
– Nixon viewed the party system as an obstacle to effective
governance
– The Watergate scandal strengthened opposition to the unilateral
use of presidential power
– He left the office in complete institutional isolation, which
continued during the Ford and Carter years
 Reagan and the Revitalization of Party Politics
– The erosion of old-style partisan politics allowed a more national
and issue-oriented party system to develop
– The Republican Party in particular developed a formidable
organizational apparatus
The Presidency and Political Parties
(S.M. Milkis)
– Reagan broke with the tradition of the modern presidency and
identified closely with his party
– A strong Republican Party provided Reagan with the support of a
formidable institution
– The Republican Party strengthened Reagan and Reagan’s
popularity strengthened his party
– Reagan frequently pursued programs with acts of administrative
discretion that short-circuited the legislative process
 Reagan and Bush
– 1988 election: Republican dominance in the White House while
the Democrats increased in numbers almost everywhere else
– The unprecedented partisan and electoral division characterized
the era of divided power
The Presidency and Political Parties
(S.M. Milkis)
 Clinton and the Politics of Divided Democracy
– In 1992, Democrats captured the presidency and preserved
majorities in Congress
– Clinton promised to restore consensus to American politics
– Confrontation emerged when Clinton announced support for
homosexuals in the military and reversed a Reagan executive
order of forbidding abortion counseling at federally funded clinics
– Clinton’s support for NAFTA went against the interests of labor
unions
– His ambitious healthcare program angered conservatives and
when it failed, disillusioned liberals
– In 1996, Clinton failed to endorse candidates from his party
– Clinton became the first elected president since Andrew Johnson
to be impeached
The Presidency and Political Parties
(S.M. Milkis)
 George W. Bush and the Ratification of the Modern
Presidency
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Bush and Gore took centrist, pragmatic positions
Both distanced themselves from their parties
The conclusion of the election failed to arouse popular passions
Bush’s “compassionate conservatism” embraced the Republican
conservative values
– In 2001, Republicans lost control of the Senate
– Bush sought to attract people from different sectors:
• Faith-based initiatives (Christian conservative groups)
• Education reform (state governors)
• Medicare’s prescription drug program (retired persons)
– Bush’s administration has been more attentive to party building
than any other White House
The Presidency and Political Parties
(S.M. Milkis)
 His display of religiosity and moral language has
energized Republican partisans
 Since the 1970s the Republican Party has been
developing what can be called “the first national party
machine,” based on grassroots mobilization
 The new party system is more amenable to presidential
governance, but not completely subordinate to it
Ex Parte Milligan (1866)
Background: After the terrorist acts of September
11, 2001, Bush sought wide prerogative and
new statutory powers to deal with the war on
terrorism. The presidential quest for
emergency powers is always greatest in time of
war. In 1861, President Lincoln secretly
authorized the suspension of the writ of habeas
corpus in the vicinity of the military line in
Maryland.
Ex Parte Milligan (1866)
 Lambdin P. Milligan presented a petition to be discharged
from an alleged unlawful imprisonment
 In 1864, he was brought before a military commission at
Indianapolis, tried, found guilty, and sentenced to be
hanged
 He insisted that the military commission had no
jurisdiction to try him and that his right to a civilian trial
had been ignored
 The Court’s decision:
– Every American citizen has a right to be tried and punished
according to law
– Laws and usage of war cannot be applied to citizens in states
which have upheld the authority of the government
Ex Parte Milligan (1866)
– Constitutional provisions were infringed when Milligan was tried
by a court not ordained and established by Congress
– Another guarantee of freedom was broken when he was denied
a trial by jury
– His trial and conviction by a military commission was illegal
 Chief Justice’s dissent:
– When the writ of habeas is suspended, the president may:
• Arrest as well as detain
• Punishment by military commissions, as well as arrests and
detentions, in states where civil courts are open may be authorized
by Congress
Presidential Powers in Times of
Emergency (J.W. Dean)
 At present, the president has opted to exercise only a
few of his emergency powers
 We do not know what shape this undeclared war on
terrorism will take
 American presidents posses awesome powers
– Potentially this includes the power of a “constitutional
dictatorship”
 Democracy works best in times of peace
 Americans want their president to do whatever is
necessary to protect them
 Governing by committees or legislative bodies never
works in times of crisis
Presidential Powers in Times of
Emergency (J.W. Dean)
 The Constitution contains no express provisions for
emergency or crisis
 The Supreme Court made it clear in Ex Parte Milligan that
the government has all the powers granted to it which are
necessary to preserve its existence
 The distinction between a constitutional dictator and a
strong president is very thin or nonexistent
 The temporary concentration of power in the executive is
necessary for the preservation of the established system
 Constitutional dictatorship is a dangerous thing that can
remain after the crisis is abated
 Each national crisis has left the nation a little less
democratic