America’s Greatest Shell Game: The Increase of Presidential Powers
I often like to keep an open mind when reading and watching the news about the hubbub within the political world. I’ll switch back and forth from Fox News to CNN, glance through both the NY Times and the Wall Street Journal, as well as listen to Neal Boortz or Rush Limbaugh when I’m able. So when National Public Radio’s (NPR) Ari Shapiro came to Wabash last semester to give a talk on the increase of Presidential powers, I was intrigued. Although at first I was skeptic of his mainly liberal ideas, during the lecture I found I agreed with him on most of the points he presented. And ironically, most of those points disagreed with my conservative background. It is not often that I disagree with the actions of the right and agree with an individual from a liberal media outlet; yet I was convinced by Shapiro’s well-engineered argument. His primary message for the evening was the Bush administration’s wrong increase in Presidential powers throughout the last eight years, and how alarming that should be to the American public. He stated that this administration, Vice President Dick Cheney especially, instead of maintaining the historical and Constitutional system of checks and balances in Washington instituted the largest expansion of power of the executive branch since FDR’s administration during his New Deal, while decreasing the power of the legislative and judicial branches.
Shapiro began his October 13, 2008, Wabash lecture enlightening the crowd that the source of today’s increase of Presidential powers stems from three events that all occurred within the last 100 years: the Truman administration during the 1952 Steel Strike, Dick Cheney’s tenure in Congress, and 9/11. He explained that all of this culminated into the hallmark of a classic shell game, or an attempt to defraud a person or group through their own purposely misled confidence. Shapiro argued that in this shell game, the Bush administration increased the power of the executive branch but made it appear to legitimate follow the Constitution. The American public was kept from realizing that the administration defrauded not only them, but more significantly, the U.S. Constitution as well.
The 1952 Steel Strike centered on the issue of how much power a wartime President is legally allotted by the Constitution. In the time of the Korean War, President Truman saw it in the nation’s best interest to seize control of the privately owned steel mills. The Defense Production Act of September, 1950, permitted the President the requisition of any facilities, property, equipment, supplies, component parts of raw materials needed for the national defense, as well as gave the President the authority to impose wage and price controls. This was essentially eminent domain on private steel mill companies. The Act prompted the United Steelworkers of America to organize a strike in opposition to what they believed was a gross abuse of power. Upon the strike, the Supreme Court ruled in the 1952 case Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer that the President had no authority to seize private property in the absence of either specifically enumerated authority under Article Two of the United States Constitution or statutory authority conferred on him by Congress. The President’s attempt to seize more power through the Defense Production Act was deemed unconstitutional, but even still, it began a gradual elevation of Presidential power that has since expanded in subsequent administrations.
Fast-forward to the 1980’s and we see Dick Cheney’s role as a Congressman from Wyoming. While in Congress, Cheney was able to circumvent the Constitution’s ambiguity on Presidential power. Shapiro’s evidence of this was the results of the Iran-Contra scandal of 1986. As the scandal became unearthed, a special commission was formed to investigate the shady actions of the involved persons and consider how much blowback the scandal caused. Upon the conclusion of the investigation Cheney authored a controversial minority opinion, arguing that the most significant factor behind the Iran-Contra scandal was the President not having enough power to direct his foreign policy. He stated, “Congressional actions to limit the President in this area therefore should be reviewed with a considerable degree of skepticism. If they interfere with the core presidential foreign policy functions, they should be struck down.” Cheney claimed that the Constitution provides for a strong President who has the Constitutional authority to operate his office as he sees fit. This was very significant, Shapiro argued, since it laid the foundation of the Bush administration’s view of executive authority.
The final factor in this relatively recent spike in executive power, Shapiro continued, was 9/11. The tragic events of September, 2001, created a “nation at war” mentality, a mentality that often can lead to widespread breakdown in social law and order. So, in Cheney’s theory, in such times as that it is the duty of the President to step in and take full control of the situation and act as he best sees fit. After the attacks the result was a wide spectrum of laws being passed and implemented, among which where the controversial PATRIOT Act and the FISA bill, both of which smack of unjust abuse of power.
The effect of these three events, Shapiro claimed, has been a dramatic shift in the balance of power within the government, whereby the executive branch has gained much more power and the legislative and judicial branches have suffered a considerable shrinking of power. If a President claims to have the Constitutional authority to operate as he sees fit, he doesn’t have to follow the laws Congress passes or act according to how the Supreme Court interprets the laws. The best evidence of this is the Presidential Signing Statements, where the President writes a pronouncement on a bill directly before he passes it into a law. In other words, the President can write anything on any bill, modifying the meaning of a duly enacted law, and pronounce that he may or may not follow this part or that he interprets this particular section differently than how it is meant to be interpreted. It should be noted that the Bush administration has issued more signing statements in eight years than all of the previous Presidencies combined.
But as Shapiro mused, now that the Bush administration has come to a close, the question remaining is what President Obama will do now that he has inherited the executive branch and its elevated power. Will he continue the trend started by the Bush administration or will he place the executive branch back into the balance of power among the legislative and judicial branches? It is too early to speculate possible answers, but I would place a cautious eye on his plans as he begins his first days in office. More importantly, in light of these three historical events we should take notice of his political career and the individuals he has appointed to be in his office and cabinet.
It is disturbing to note that while President Obama was a state Senator for Illinois during 1997-2004 and then a United States Senator in 2005, he was among the realm of the corrupt Illinois Governors George Ryan and Rod Blagojevich. When Governor Blagojevich appointed Roland Burris as the replacement of Obama’s senate seat, the people of Illinois as well as the Democrats of the United States Senate cried foul, charging that any appointee chosen by Blagojevich may very well be tainted with the very corruption that laces Blagojevich’s office. While Obama himself is supposedly untouched by Illinois corruption, his Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel has been called an “ally” of Blagojevich. Also, Governor of New Mexico and Secretary of Commerce appointee Bill Richardson recently backed down only due to a federal investigation into shady ties with a company that has done business with his state. Other appointments Obama has made include many former members of Bill Clinton’s administration, and we all know how “honest” an administration that was. Based on these and other appointments made by Obama I would say that the actions of the administration should be heavily scrutinized in order to judge accurately their utilization of executive power.
This all should cause a great deal of concern for the American people, since the increasing of Presidential powers by means of deception, corruption, or other means, is not only unconstitutional but utterly tyrannical. The American people should not and must not fall hook, line, and sinker for the assumed “constitutional” actions of the executive branch, which in fact might be sham interpretations to serve as a means to a tragic end: to make the executive branch the sole authority of the United States government.
Especially in this time of war, special concern should be placed on the lessons history teaches us. While it is enumerated in the Constitution that the President is to serve as Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy, this doesn’t give him free reign to do as he pleases. He is to act according to the laws of Congress (most especially the Constitution) and to the interpretation of those laws by the Supreme Court. Dick Cheney’s actions as a Congressman, when he sought to decrease the power of Congress and increase the power of the President, were a grave foreshadowing long before his tenure as Vice President. Even though this nation may be at war, the President has no Constitutional power to assert his authority as he sees fit, whether in wire tapping the homes of American citizens (FISA Bill) or in denying the same citizens the right to due process even if it is in the name of national security. Despite the benefits these laws seem to bring, their very essence should alarm the American people. The wise words of Benjamin Franklin, “They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety”, give a chilling testament to this.
Though the office of the Presidency has seen a whole host of individuals with a wide spectrum of characteristics, I feel that the office should be one most importantly of humility towards the American people. The President should be always called to uphold the oath he swore at the start of his term, “…to faithfully execute the office of President of the United States…to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution.” Simple mistakes in reciting the oath may be forgivable, but the same slip-up in performing the oath while in office cannot be taken as light-heartedly. The Presidency was not, is not, nor ever shall be an office with the authority to solidify absolute power. The creation of or evolution into such an office would be a certain danger to the American people.
No matter Shapiro’s political alignment, I could not disagree with his fundamental point: as has been proved throughout history, in the end, absolute power corrupts absolutely.
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