Power of the President

How much power does the President really have? Does the President sometimes overstep his boundaries? Can the President also be put in his place by the legislative branch or the judicial branch? The answer to both of the latter questions is yes. Yes the president oversteps his boundaries, but there are also times when he has almost no power and his powers can be taken away from him. There are times when he uses his influence and power to have an affair, when he goes to war without Congress making a declaration of war; there are times when he makes executive agreement that the Senate can do nothing about. There are also times when the president is impeached, which is the greatest of punishments when concerning the president. The president has many powers, both given by the Constitution and inferred.

The president has a list of his powers and what he is allowed to do while in office. The Constitution itself gives the president his rights and boundaries. For instance, the president is allowed to be elected to a term for four years according to Article II of the Constitution. “He shall hold his office during the Term of four Years, together with the Vice President…” (Lawler, pg. 411) A follow up to this would be the 22nd Amendment which states that the president cannot be elected for more than two terms. “No person shall be elected to the office of the President more than twice…” (Lawler, pg 422) This amendment was put into place after Franklin D. Roosevelt ran for and won the presidency three times in a row and Congress realized that there could be some people who would continue to run and perhaps win until they die in office. This could lead to a dictatorship and it is better to not risk it, just in case a president decides to take more power than he has. My point in this is that from the beginning the Founding Fathers were trying not to make the president a king-like figure that could take control. The Founding Fathers decided to limit the

Cited: Crenson, Matthew A. and Benjamin Ginsberg. Presidential Power: Unchecked and Unbalanced. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2007. Fausold, Martin L. and Alan Shank. The Constitution and the American Presidency. Albany: SUNY Press, 1991. infoplease. 25 2 2013 <http://www.infoplease.com/spot/impeach.html>. Jr., George Lardner. "Another Tape Found Faulty, Sirica Is Told; Haldeman, Nixon Talk Is Involved." Washington Post 18 November 1973. Kilpatrick, Carroll. "President Refuses to Turn Over Tapes; Ervin Committee, Cox Issue Subpoenas." Washington Post 24 July 1973. Lawler, Peter Augustine and Robert Martin Schaeffer. American Political Rhetoric. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefeild Publishers, 2005. legal-dictionary. 02 2013 <http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/Presidential+Powers>. MacKenzie, John P. "Court Orders Nixon to Yield Tapes; President Promises to Comply Fully." Washington Post 25 July 1974.