“Executive Privilege” and The President
In 1789 George Washington was elected the first president of the United States. Since then we have had 44 presidents with the 45th on his way into office. Since Washington has been in office there has always been a practice of executive privilege among our presidents. Although it was never discussed until Eisenhower came into office the executive privilege has always been around. Executive privilege is a practice I believe we should keep around. In my essay I will be exploring what it means for a president to have executive privilege, whether or not a president should have this privilege, and the history behind it. “Executive privilege is is the constitutional principle that permits the president
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Too many people have strong opinions and act on them. As we can see with the election just passing us many protest broke out from those opinions that people had. Imagine if we knew our country's secrets and what the president is doing behind the closed doors of his office. We elect who we think is best for our country so I feel there is no need to know what decisions he's making because he has our country's best interest in mind. Many would disagree with being kept in the dark. As Americans we feel it is our right to know what is going on because we are paying money to live here. Also presidents can also take advantage of the executive privilege by concealing wrongdoing, and politically damaging information about them. When Obama used the executive privilege over the DOJ documents, some claimed it was inappropriate use of his power, in which he replied that he's keeping congress out of where they should not be. This I believe is a fine example of a good use of the executive privilege. Nowhere in the constitution does it state executive privilege and as “the late legal historian Raoul Berger once said it is one of the greatest ‘constitutional myths’. ” Our country is constantly evolving so whether or not something is in the constitution I believe if something is right then it should happen regardless of if it's in the constitution or
Presidential Courage, written by Michael Beschloss, takes the reader through a series of events over 200 years involving 9 different presidents and how America grew to highly respect them. Out of the 9, George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, and Harry Truman were the top 3 most revered Presidents. Beschloss uncovers the troubles each and every single one of the president’s moment of crisis and how they all overcame these problems while risking the stability of the country. George Washington had faced his biggest challenge in the political field and surprisingly not the battlefield in 1795 when he attempted to turn away from a new war against Great Britain that he knew the United States could not succeed.
One of the powers in question is the president’s power to executive privilege, and define what is to be evidence that could potentially breach national security. I understand that this is an appropriate power for a president of a major country, that has friends as well as foes, whose intentions are to be accounted for. But how President Nixon deemed his recordings to be possibly harmful to national security, was visibly contradictory to what the power was meant to
“Andrew Bacevich speaks truth to power, no matter who is in power, which may be why those of both the left and the right listen to him”, this is a phrase by Bill Moyers. It clearly indicates that, the limits of power offers an unparalleled and deep look into the political crisis that America as a country is generally facing. The book by Andrew Bacevich argues on several concepts of presidency and the democratic rights that should be followed in coming up with the right governance rules (Bacevich 11). Bacevich was an American philosopher and therefore talked of several issues that affected the political life of Americans. He is best known for the book he did on Limits of power, which addressed a number of topics.
President of the United States of America is an honorable title, one of dignity but also of controversy. As the leader of the free world, the president is under constant scrutiny; both George W. Bush and Woodrow Wilson are two presidents that have had a glimpse at both positions. In the second inaugural address of President Bush and President Wilson’s succeeding introduction into presidency, the Yale and Princeton alumni both have modicum rhetorical strategies to comfort and reassure the citizen in the times of heading to war. Forty-third President, George W. Bush gave his second initiation speech on January 20, 2005. At this time, the tragic event of 9/11 still a vivid picture in the minds of the American people.
In the Rhetorical Presidency, Tulis argues the existence of two constitutional presidencies; an uppercase “Constitutional” presidency and a lowercase “constitutional” presidency. The “Constitutional” presidency refers to the presidency as created by the men who wrote the Constitution, in which the president draws his authority from the Constitution and does not lead public opinion. In contrast, the “constitutional” presidency refers to the president drawing his authority from the Constitution and his ability to lead public opinion. Thereby, the two constitutional presidencies ultimately conflict with each other. The presidency has drastically evolved over the decades to become the “constitutional” presidency, whereby an activist president
Should the Executive Privilege Be Absolute In United States, the Executive Privilege played a positive role on the president in domestic and foreign policy decisions, defend national interests and the protection of national defense secrets. However, this privilege can be abused by the president and executive members as well in seizing power, even provide legal basis to disguise their illicit activities at the White House. In my point of view, I think the executive privilege should not be absolute due to lack of transparency and supervision on the matter of personal interest and national security. As the strongest nation across the global, the president and members of the executive of the United States has the power to conduct a number of operations or information in secret and the executive privilege grants them to resist some legislative and branches of government for disclosing those communications if would potentially interfere the functions of executive branch (Legal Information Institute).
It is impossible to discuss civil liberties and security without talking about 9/11 and the Patriot Act. The Patriot Act was passed almost immediately after 9/11, hugely expanding intelligence agencies ability to investigate potential terrorism. However, critics of the law say that it infringed on the civil liberties of the innocent and did not guarantee proper oversight of law enforcement agencies in their execution and use of these newfound powers. I agree that as war and violence evolve, so must our methods of preventing them. In this digital age preventing such violence means monitoring information channels and being able to respond to leads rapidly and subtly.
National security is built on the backbone of ignorance. It is foolish to think the government does not hide things from the public; it is the goal of national security. Ignorance plays into national security because technologies must remain secret for public safety. Millions of classified documents exist beyond public domain, and thousands more are created every day. If everyone in America knew about the latest military technology, very soon we would see America’s new technology popping up in China, Russia, and even India.
Now the most famous one of the acts was the Watergate Scandal this was when the president and the FBI basically got into private things and discovered lots of secrets. Now he resigned the most famous president chooses to stop with all this and just leave, he wanted to be a Queen and show all these other people who he was and how much control he had over his life. Let me give you a definition for Executive Power and what it was, it is the executive branch and all those in it including the president, they really do use this power to their advantage. Affirmative Action itis to show equality to all those who are
After the long speech rehearsals, extravagant campaigns, timely flights and sleepless nights are over, the real mission begins. Directly after taking office, the president is put to work. From the day the head of state walks into the white house, until the day he/she leaves the office, there is no end to the restless nights. But, in the words of uncle Ben (Spider-man's uncle) "with great power comes great responsibility." However, a president must be responsible with the way he/she uses his/her power, considering that the commander in chief has an abundance of it.
In my opinion I do not feel that it is justification for bypassing Congress. Just because he is the President should not mean because he doesn’t like the way things are going he can just bypass them all. I kind of feel like that is a huge reason why things in our country are they way that they are. The president doesn’t care about what anyone else has to say only what he thinks is right. Unlike many other politicians or interest groups, the president does not have to work hard to receive media coverage.
The Research Essay – The Presidency, then and now Over the time of American History, the power and influence of the American presidency has matured and expanded exponentially. As we have identified in class, specific events, and certain presidents have contributed to this evolution. The presidents also have employed three major perspectives for wielding executive power. Now I want to explain in detail this expansion; what are three major wield powers they have and explain them in detail.
In modern day history, Executive Order 8802 granted The United States’ a first black president, Barack Obama. As a country, The United States has experienced many hardships and accomplishments, but it is what makes America a strong country. FDR took a grand leap in issuing Executive Order 8802 ,as it changed the lives’ of many who had been stripped of their voice for years, and finally began to regain it with Executive Order
Government censorship has been a very controversial topic for many years now with most citizens wanting there to be no government censorship of information,and with government officials saying that the citizens are safer if they do not know certain information. I think that all information should be open to the public no matter what, with more recent events happening in the world such as terrorist attacks and shootings the public deserves to know all details on what is happening and not just what the government wants us to know. for people in north korea, they will do almost anything to obtain information that is not force fed to them by their government and if they are caught with that sort of information, there are hefty fines or even execution. For students over in idaho and north carolina they are being deprived of learning about the history of the united states and the
In recent years there has been debate on whether or not the president has too much power. The president 's power has increased over the years, I believe that this increase has given the president way too much power. The amount of power that the president has, can cause total destruction and can manipulate people into doing things that they do not actually believe in. A president should not have some of the powers that he possess, but they are given to him simply because he is the leader of the country. In my opinion the president should be allowed certain powers in order to run the country properly, he is also the leader of the country which grants him the right to have certain powers according to the constitution.