UGA Glas Pols 1101- chapter 7 (presidency)

Executive office of the president

A coalition of agencies that help the president oversee department and agency activities, formulate budgets and monitor spending, craft legislation, and lobby congress. The major components of this, established in 1939 by President Franklin Roosevelt, include the White House office, office of management and budget, national security council, and council of economic advisors, among other agencies.

Expressed Powers of the Presidency

The Constitution explicitly assigned the president the power to sign or veto legislation, command the armed forces, ask for the written opinion of their Cabinet, convene or adjourn Congress, grant reprieves and pardons, and receive ambassadors.

Checks on the President

Courts can declare actions of the president unconstitutional, Veto override with 2/3 vote from senate, Presidents can be impeached, Elections and public opinion

Implied Powers of the Presidency

Serve as head of state, enter into treaties/agreements, issue executive orders, organize the bureaucracy, exercise of executive privilege

Executive orders

A presidential directive to an executive agency establishing new policies or indicating how an existing policy is to be carried out.

Going public

Presidents do this when they engage in intensive public relations to promote their policies to the voters and thereby induce cooperation from other elected officeholders in Washington.

Presidential memorandum

A presidential directive to an agency directing it to alter its administration of policies along lines prescribed in the memorandum. When published in the Federal Register, it assumes the same legal standing of an executive order.

Signing statement

A statement issued by the president that is intended to modify implementation or ignore altogether provisions of a new law.

State of the Union Address

A message to Congress under the constitutional directive that the president shall "from time to time give to the Congress Information of the State of the Union, and recommend to their Consideration such Measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient."

War Powers Act

Law that requires the president to inform Congress within forty-eight hours of committing troops abroad in a military action.

The Cabinet

The formal group of presidential advisors who head the major departments and agencies of the federal government. Members are chosen by the president and approved by the senate.

Electoral college

A body of electors in each state, chosen by voters, who formally elect the president and Vice President. Each state's number of electoral votes depends on its representation in Congress; DC has 3. An absolute majority is required elect a president and a VP.

Selective enforcement

occurs when government officials such as police officers, prosecutors, or regulators exercise enforcement discretion, which is the power to choose whether or how to punish a person who has violated the law

Prosecutorial discretion

is the authority of an agency or officer to decide what charges to bring and how to pursue each case. A law-enforcement officer who declines to pursue a case against a person has favorably exercised this

What institutional powers are granted to the president in the Constitution? What are the non- constitutional powers of the president?

What is going public? What specific tools or resources are available to the president when he chooses this strategy

In what ways has presidential power expanded over time?

What are executive orders? To whom do their directly apply? And what influence may they have over the American public?

Know the electoral college. How it was designed and operated at first and how it has changed over time (things to keep in mind: slavery and the 3/5th compromise, the selection of electors, and elector agency).

What is a battleground state? How does the electoral college privilege these states at the expense of the rest?

How has the 'commander and chief' power changed over time? What is a line-item veto?

Explain how the president's power to persuade works?