Presidential Powers

Capa
NYU Press, 01/02/2005 - 279 páginas

Framed in Article II of the Constitution, presidential powers are dictated today by judicial as well as historical precedent. To understand the ways the president wields power as well as how this power is kept in check by other branches of government, Harold J. Krent presents three overlapping determinants of the president's role under the Constitution-the need for presidential initiative in administering the law and providing foreign policy leadership, the importance of maintaining congressional control over policymaking, and the imperative to ensure that the president be accountable to the public.
Krent’s examination is sweeping, ranging from the president's ability to appoint and remove executive branch officials, to the president's role in proposing and implementing treaties and the power to conduct war, to the extent the president can refuse to turn over information in response to congressional and judicial requests. Finally, Krent addresses the history and purposes of presidential pardons.
By drawing on historic and contemporary presidential actions to illustrate his points, Krent reminds us that the president is both an exalted leader with the regalia of power and an American who is and should be accountable to fellow citizens-important considerations as we elect and assess our presidents.

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Índice

Introduction
1
1 The Presidents Power to Execute the Laws Passed by Congress
17
2 The Executives Power over Foreign Affairs
85
3 The Protective Power of the President
133
4 Presidential Immunities and Priviledges
161
5 The Pardon Power
189
Conclusion
215
Notes
219
Bibliography
261
Index
269
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Passagens conhecidas

Página 147 - The Constitution of the United States is a law for rulers and people, equally in war and in peace, and covers with the shield of its protection all classes of men, at all times, and under all circumstances. No doctrine involving more pernicious consequences was ever invented by the wit of man than that any of its provisions can be suspended during any of the great exigencies of government.
Página 126 - Prominent on the surface of any case held to involve a political question is found a textually demonstrable constitutional commitment of the issue to a coordinate political department; or a lack of judicially discoverable and manageable standards for resolving it; or the impossibility of deciding without an initial policy determination of a kind clearly for nonjudicial discretion...
Página 234 - President by an exertion of legislative power, but with such an authority plus the very delicate, plenary and exclusive power of the President as the sole organ of the federal government in the field of international relations...
Página 147 - ... society; and as no power is left but the military, it is allowed to govern by martial rule until the laws can have their free course. As necessity creates the rule, so it limits its duration ; for, if this government is continued after the courts are reinstated, it is a gross usurpation of power. Martial rule can never exist where the courts are open, and in the proper and unobstructed exercise of their jurisdiction.
Página 14 - My view was that every executive officer, and above all every executive officer in high position, was a steward of the people, bound actively and affirmatively to do all he could for the people, and not to content himself with the negative merit of keeping his talents undamaged in a napkin.
Página 142 - But a judicial construction of the due process clause that will sustain this order is a far more subtle blow to liberty than the promulgation of the order itself.
Página 131 - It is quite apparent that if, in the maintenance of our international relations, embarrassment — perhaps serious embarrassment — is to be avoided and success for our aims achieved, congressional legislation which is to be made effective through negotiation and inquiry within the international field must often accord to the President a degree of discretion and freedom from statutory restriction which would not be admissible were domestic affairs alone involved.
Página 140 - Whoever, except in cases and under circumstances expressly authorized by the Constitution or Act of Congress, willfully uses any part of the Army or the Air Force as a posse comitatus or otherwise to execute the laws shall be fined not more than $10,000 or imprisoned not more than two years or both.
Página 90 - The United States in Congress assembled, shall have the sole and exclusive right and power of determining on peace and war except in the cases mentioned in the sixth article; of sending and receiving ambassadors; entering into treaties and alliances...
Página 243 - A strict observance of the written laws is doubtless one of the high duties of a good citizen, but it is not the highest. The laws of necessity, of selfpreservation, of saving our country when in danger, are of higher obligation. To lose our country by a scrupulous adherence to written law, would be to lose the law itself, with life, liberty, property and all those who are enjoying them with us; thus absurdly sacrificing the end to the means.

Acerca do autor (2005)

Harold J. Krent is dean and professor of law at the Chicago-Kent College of Law.

Informação bibliográfica