executive branch
Ch. 11: The Executive Branch
Section 2: The Design and Evolution of the Presidency
●Vocabulary to know:
○veto: the power to block a proposed legislation from becoming a law. The president can veto bills passed by congress to stop the bill from becoming law, but congress can “override” the veto by a 2/3rds vote of both the House and Senate. If congress overrides, the bill becomes law despite the president’s veto
○veto override: The president can veto bills passed by congress to stop the bill from becoming law, but congress can “override” the veto by a 2/3rds vote of both the House and Senate. If congress overrides, the bill becomes law despite the president’s veto
○the Cabinet: heads of the fifteen major bureaucratic departments within the executive branch who help the president in setting and executing policy
○executive order: a ruler order issued by the president that has the force of law. Executive orders are deemed valid only if they are authorized by the congressional statute
○executive privilege: the president’s right to withhold information from congress, the judiciary, or the public, under certain circumstances.
○executive agreements: agreements between the president and another country made without formal consent by the Senate. Functions like treaties except they can be unilaterally broken by future presidents, making them less secure and reliable from the perspective of other countries.
○impoundment: decision by the president to not spend money that has been appropriated by congress.
●According to the original Constitution, what length and number of terms could Presidents serve? How was this changed by the 22nd Amendment?
The president could serve four year terms with no limit on the number of times a president could run for reelection. The 22nd limits the president to only two four year terms, and this was ratified in 1951.
Section 3: The Presidential Election Process
●Vocabulary to know
○four stages of the presidential selection process
Primaries and caucuses
National convention
General election
Electoral college
○primary: state-level election where voters cast ballots for their preferred candidate.
○caucus: meeting at which local members of a political party register their preference among candidates running for president or select delegates to attend the party’s national convention.
○national party conventions: party organizations, leaders, and workers met in national conventions to choose their nominee. Political parties kept a tight control on the selection of a candidate.
○Electoral College: The term "Electoral College" is often used as shorthand for referring to the system of electing the president in the general election. But it can also simply refer to an actual group of people -- the "college" consisting of 538 "electors" -- who meet in their respective states in December of presidential election years to cast ballots for president and vice president.
○electors: who meet in their respective states in December of presidential election years to cast ballots for president and vice president.
○faithless electors: an elector defies their party by not voting for the party's nominee
○National Popular Vote Interstate Compact: States that join this interstate compact commit through legislation to award their states' presidential electors to the candidate who receives the most votes nationwide, regardless of which candidate received the most votes in their state. This is allowed under the Constitution for the same reason that faithless electors are allowed: the Constitution establishes no rules regulating how states allocate their electors or how each elector decides to vote.
●What are the political consequences of using the presidential primary and caucus system
Extended campaign periods, early-state influence, partisan engagement, and voter engagement disparities.
●What determines how many electors a state has?
The number of electors a state has is determined by its total congressional representation:
Number of Representatives (based on population) + 2 Senators = Total electors.
For example, a state with 10 representatives and 2 senators has 12 electoral votes.
●What method does nearly every state use for selecting electors?
Nearly every state uses the winner-take-all method, where the candidate who wins the plurality of the popular vote in that state gets all its electoral votes.
Exceptions: Maine and Nebraska use a district-based system where electoral votes are distributed by congressional district, with two additional votes going to the statewide winner.
●Are states allowed to make it illegal for electors to be “faithless electors”?
Yes, states are allowed to make it illegal for electors to be "faithless electors."
In the 2020 Chiafalo v. Washington decision, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld laws penalizing or replacing electors who do not vote according to their state's popular vote.
●Who were the last two presidents to receive less than a plurality of the popular vote but still become president by winning a majority of the Electoral College votes?
George W. Bush in 2000
Donald Trump in 2016
●According to the Constitution, if no candidate wins a majority of the Electoral College votes, which institution decides the winner and how exactly does that institution decide?
Institution: The House of Representatives decides the winner.
Process:
Each state delegation casts one vote, regardless of the size of its population.
A majority of state delegations (currently 26 out of 50) must agree on a candidate.
The Senate selects the Vice President in a similar process, with each senator casting one vote.
In how many elections has this method been used? In which century did that last happen?
This method has been used 3 times:
1800 (Thomas Jefferson vs. Aaron Burr)
1824 (John Quincy Adams vs. Andrew Jackson)
1836 (contested Vice Presidential election).
Century of the last occurrence:
The 19th century (1824 for a presidential election, 1836 for a vice presidential election).
●In 2021, what happened on January 6th, the date that Congress met to officially count the electoral votes?
On January 6, 2021, Congress met for a joint session to officially count and certify the Electoral College votes for the 2020 presidential election. During this process:
A violent mob of supporters of then-President Donald Trump stormed the U.S. Capitol, disrupting the proceedings.
The attack occurred after Trump held a rally nearby, where he repeated false claims about election fraud and encouraged his supporters to "fight like hell."
The rioters breached the Capitol, leading to evacuations of lawmakers, damage to property, and several deaths.
After order was restored, Congress reconvened later that evening and certified Joe Biden's victory.
●Which institution would have decided the outcome of the 2020 election if the efforts to pressure Congress and Vice President Pence to refuse to certify the election’s results had succeeded? Which candidate (Trump or Biden) was that institution most likely to choose as president?
Institution: If Congress and Vice President Pence had refused to certify the Electoral College results, the outcome would likely have been decided by the House of Representatives under the process outlined in the 12th Amendment.
Process: In this scenario, each state delegation in the House would cast one vote, with a majority (26 of 50 states) required to elect the president.
Most likely outcome: Since Republicans controlled a majority of state delegations in the House of Representatives in early 2021, the institution was more likely to select Donald Trump as president despite Joe Biden's popular and Electoral College victories.
Section 4: Presidential Power: Formal and Informal
●Vocabulary to know:
○President’s power of removal: Presidents may not be able to appoint key members of their administration without Senate confirmation, but they can demand the resignation or removal of cabinet officers, high-ranking appointees (such as ambassadors), and members of the presidential staff.
○President’s power of pardon: A pardon is an act of forgiveness that can help remove some of the consequences of a conviction. The president can grant pardons unconditionally or conditionally, and can also commute sentences. However, a pardon is not a declaration of innocence, and it doesn't erase all records of the conviction.
○President’s power as Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces: As the command-in-chief of the armed forces, presidents hire and fire military commanders and aggressively deploy U.S. military forces.
○President’s informal powers of persuasion and negotiation: It is left to the president to employ a strategy of negotiation, persuasion, and compromise in order to secure policy achievements in cooperation with Congress. In 1960, political scientist Richard Neustadt put forward the thesis that presidential power is the power to persuade, a process that takes many forms and is expressed in various ways.* Yet the successful employment of this technique can lead to significant and durable successes
○“going public”: involves the president delivering a major television address in the hope that Americans watching the address will be compelled to contact their House and Senate members and that such public pressure will result in the legislators supporting the president on a major piece of legislation.
●What limits does the Constitution place on the President’s pardon power?
No state crimes, no impact on impeachment, no pardon for future crimes, and no judicial oversight.
●Has the use of executive orders increased or decreased since the presidency of Theodore Roosevelt?
Increased
●As Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces, do Presidents today typically involve or bypass Congress when engaging in military hostilities?
Presidents today often bypass Congress when engaging in military hostilities, relying on their authority as Commander in Chief.
Section 5: Organization of the Executive Branch I: The President’s Support Team
●Vocabulary to know:
○White House Staff: Presidents generally rely most heavily on the members of the White House staff, which usually consists of their closest and most trusted advisers.
○Chief of Staff: The chief of staff is viewed as the president’s right-hand person. Usually, the chief of staff controls the president’s calendar, limits access to the president, manages the staff, and helps the president in all aspects of domestic and foreign policy. The most essential qualification for the position of chief of staff is loyalty to the president.
○The Cabinet: The cabinet now includes the heads of the fifteen major executive departments in addition to certain other high-level executive officials. At one time, the cabinet members were close advisers to the president, but their role has gradually changed as the bureaucracy has grown, the powers of the president have expanded, expectations of the president have increased, and presidents have come to rely more on the White House staff.
○The Vice President: Despite provisions for the election of a vice president (to serve in case of the president’s death, resignation, or removal through the impeachment process), and apart from the suggestion that the vice president should be responsible for presiding over the Senate, the Constitution leaves the vice president’s role undeveloped. As a result, the influence of the vice presidency has varied dramatically, depending on how much of a role the vice president is given by the president.
●Why is the Chief of Staff the President’s most important aide?
Manages the white house, controls access to the President, advises on political and policy strategies, coordinates policy development, and ensures loyalty and discipline.
●Do presidents rely on their cabinets for advice as much today as they did in the nineteenth century?
No, presidents today rely far less on their cabinets for advice than they did in the nineteenth century. Instead, they rely more on the White House staff
●Which President was the first to make a conscious effort to make vice presidents a more central part of the President’s policy team?
Jimmy Carter
●Which two first ladies are credited with doing the most to set new and higher standards for the role of the first spouse in political advocacy?
Eleanor Roosevelt and Hillary Clinton
Section 6: Limits on the Executive Branch I: Presidential Accountability
●Vocabulary to know:
○impeachment: Impeachment is the act of charging a government official with serious wrongdoing; the Constitution calls this wrongdoing high crimes and misdemeanors.
○removal: First, the House of Representatives could impeach the president by a simple majority vote. In the second step, the Senate could remove the president from office by a two-thirds majority, with the chief justice of the Supreme Court presiding over the trial. Upon conviction and removal of the president, if that occurred, the vice president would become president.
●Which chamber of Congress impeaches a president, and what must the vote count be?
The House of Representatives has the sole power to impeach a president.
Impeachment requires a majority vote (more than 50% of the members present and voting).
●Which chamber of Congress decides whether to remove an impeached president, and what must the vote count be?
The Senate decides whether to remove an impeached president.
Removal requires a two-thirds majority vote (67 out of 100 senators if all are present).
●Who is the only president to be impeached twice?
Donald Trump
●Has any president been impeached AND removed?
No.
●Who becomes president when a president is removed from office?
Vice President
Section 7: Organization of the Executive Branch II: The Bureaucracy
●Vocabulary to know:
○bureaucracy: The full set of bureaucratic agencies, which are sometimes conceived of as constituting a "fourth branch of government,"
○bureaucratic agency: government unit, composed of unelected civil servants, that is established to accomplish a specific set of goals and objectives as authorized by a legislative body.
○ civil servants (also called bureaucrats): individuals who fill non elected positions in government as careers and make up the bureaucracy.
○Cabinet Departments: Cabinet departments are the major bureaucratic offices that are directly accountable to the president. There are currently fifteen cabinet departments in the federal government. Each cabinet department has a head, called a secretary, that is appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate.
○Independent Executive Agencies: bureaucratic agencies with specific tasks that are held accountable to the president but are independent from oversight by any cabinet department.
○Independent Regulatory Agencies: they are insulated from political pressure from the president. This insulation is typically achieved by stipulating that agency heads can only be removed "for cause," meaning the president can only fire them for legitimate reasons that are clearly specified.
○Government Corporations: They exist because the services they provide are partly subject to market forces and tend to generate enough profit to be self-sustaining, but they also fulfill a vital service the government has an interest in maintaining.
●To whom do Cabinet Secretaries report?
President
●Which cabinet department didn’t exist until the twenty-first century?
Department of Homeland Security
●Do bureaucratic rules have the force of law?
Yes, bureaucratic rules (often referred to as regulations) can have the force of law when they are properly issued under the authority of enabling legislation passed by Congress.