Unit 6 Flashcards
President and VP Requirements
- 35 years old
- Natural born citizen
- Resident of the US for at least 14 years before taking office
President Characteristics and Helps if
Helps if:
* experience in government and moderate political beliefs
* A Senator or state governor
* Male and Christian, white, married and financially successful.
Characteristics:
* Leadership skills
* Must know and understand the American people
* Ability to communicate
* Sense of timing
* Ability to compromise
* Political Courage
Financial campaign backing
Federal Elections Commission (FEC):
* The FEC tracks campaign spending based on reports required by candidates. This is public info
Public Funding:
* Public funding is available for presidential candidates. If they accept public funding, they must limit how much they spend to a specific dollar amount.
Forgoing Public Money:
* Barack Obama was the first major presidential candidate to forgo public financing (2008)
* 2012-2020 Elections- No candidates have accepted public funds
Presidential Salary, the VP, and the Succession
- George Washington - 2 Term Precedent - until FDR
* 22nd Amendment (1951) 2 Terms Limit or up to 10 years - The president currently earns $400,000 a year
* Also gets a nontaxable travel allowance of up to $100,000 per year and a $50,000 expense account
President Benefits in Office
- Air Force One
- Free medical, dental, and healthcare
Domestic Staff in White House does all the cooking, shopping, and cleaning - Gov’t pays to operate the White House and hold official events
President Benefits Out of Office
- Lifetime pension (currently $199,700 a year)
- Free office space
- Free mailing services
- Lifetime secret service for them and their children
- Up to $96,000 per year for office help
- When they die their spouses are eligible for a pension of $20,000 per year
Three Constitutional Jobs for Vice Presidents:
Executive:
Takes over the presidency in case of presidential death, impeachment, or resignation.
Legislative:
The Vice President presides over the Senate and votes in case of a tie. Most VPs spend very little time in this part of the job
25th Amendment:
Under the 25th amendment, the VP helps decide whether the president is unable to carry out his or her duties and acts as president should that happen.
Selecting a Vice President:
Politically:
Someone who will counter their political ideology (further to the center OR to the right or left.
Ex: Trump & Pence OR Clinton and Gore
Geographically:
Someone from another region of the country- particularly a region that tends to support another candidate
Ex: JFK and LBJ
Culturally:
A candidate will try to pick someone from another social or cultural group. (race, age, gender, etc.)
Ex: Obama and Biden OR Biden and Harris
Presidential Succession Act of 1947
- Lays out presidential successions
- What happens if the President is unable to fulfill duties, disabled, experienced a health crisis
- VP becomes President under 2 conditions:
- If President informs Congress of an inability to perform in office
* If the VP and a majority of the cabinet inform Congress of this condition
- If President informs Congress of an inability to perform in office
- Also spells out how a President can resume the powers and duties of the office
Order of Succession:
- Vice President
- Speaker of the House
- President Pro Tempore of the Senate
- Secretary of State
- Secretary of the Treasury
Roles of the President
- Head of State = ceremonial head of government; promotes national spirit & patriotism
- Chief Executive = acts like the CEO of a huge corporation, oversees bureaucracy, executive orders and day-to-day operations.
- Commander-in-Chief = Head of the US military; responsible for its operations
- Chief Diplomat = oversees US foreign policy and negotiates treaties
- Legislative Leader = influences legislation, sets policy agenda, gives State of the Union Address
- Economic Planner = works with Congress on the Federal Budget; appoints members to the fed
- Party Leader = campaign and fundraise for party, appoints people to federal positions
Presidential (Executive) Cabinets
Secretary of State
* Antony J. Blinken
* foreign affairs and anything involving international relations, such as consulates and embassies
* Foreign Service
* Civil Service
U.S. Agency for International Development.
* Dr. Janet Yellen
* the federal government’s revenue, taxation, and accounting
* IRS
US Department of Defense
* Lloyd Austin
* largest department responsible for anything related to national security and the armed forces
* U.S. Air Force.
* U.S. Army.
* U.S. Fleet Forces Command
US Departmenty of Justice
* Merrick Garland
* enforces federal laws and prosecutes those who have committed federal crimes
* The DEA (Drug Enforcement Administration)
* FBI
US Department of the Interior
* Deb Haaland
* federal land and domestic territorial affairs
* National Park Service
* US Fish and Wildlife Service
US Department of Commerce
* Gina Raimondo
* oversees anything having to do with commerce
* National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
* The National Weather Service
US Department of Labor
* Marty Walsh
* Labor policies and practices
* Bureau of Labor Statistics and the Occupational Safety
* Health Administration (OSHA)
US Department of Health & Human services
* Xavier Becerra
* Anything having to do with public health and family services
* Center for Disease Control (CDC)
* The Federal Drug Administration (FDA)
* The National Institutes of Health (NIH)
US Department of Housing and Urban Development
* Marcia Fudge
* anything related to housing and mortgage policy
* The Federal Housing Administration
US Department of Transportation
* Pete Buttigieg
* federal transportation systems, including federal interstates
* Involved in creating, maintaining, and ensuring the safety of all transportation systems
* Federal Aviation Administration
* The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
US Department of Energy
* Jennifer Granholm
* federal energy programs, particularly those involving nuclear power
* Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy.
* Public Affairs.
* Energy Information Administration.
US Separtment of Education
* Dr. Miguel Cardona
* federal policy regarding public education and federal loans and grants for schools
* Office for Civil Rights, Department of Education.
* Office of Postsecondary Education.
US Department of Veterans Affairs
* Denis McDonough
* anything having to do with veterans
* National Cemetery Administration.
* Veterans Benefits Administration.
US Department of Agriculture
* Tom Vilsack
* farming, food, and rural economic development
* Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS)
* Agricultural Research Service (ARS)
* Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS)
US Department of Homeland Security
* Alejandro Mayorkas
* terrorism, immigration, cybersecurity, and disaster prevention
* Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)
* Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA)
State of the Union Address
- rare opportunity for all Americans to see the complete federal government in one place
- Representatives from all three branches gather in the House chamber to listen to the address
State of the Union Method, Content, and Presentation
Method:
* No mention of method in Article II, Section 3 of the Constitution’
* George Washington made a speech, Thomas Jefferson wrote a written letter
* Woodrew Wilson brought back the speech tradition
Content:
* Varied greatly, general to specific, foreign to domestic
* lay out a vision for the nation in the coming year
* Roosevelt - Four Freedoms
* LBJ - Great Society
Presentation
* Has changed
* Coolidge - first radio
* Truman - first TV
* Reagan - invited guests; set a tradition
* GWB - first webcast
Federal Agencies
- Cabinet departments (Lesson #3)
- Government Corporations
- Independent Agencies
- Regulatory Agencies
Government Corporations, why, example
Government Corporations = Agencies formed by the federal government to administer a quasi-business enterprise
Why do we have Government Corporations?
* 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.
Example:
* U.S. Postal Service
* The most widely used government corporation is the U.S. Postal Service.
* Once a cabinet department, it was transformed into a government corporation in the early 1970s
Independent Agencies
- Unlike the larger cabinet departments, independent agencies are assigned far more focused tasks.
- These agencies are independent because they are not subject to the regulatory authority of any specific department.
Examples:
CIA
* collects and manages intelligence vital to national interests
NASA
* develops technological innovation for the purposes of space exploration
EPA
* enforces laws aimed at protecting environmental sustainability
Regulatory Agencies:
- A subset of the independent agency category
- emerged as a result of the progressive push to control the benefits and costs of industrialization
- These independent regulatory agencies are not as easily influenced as by partisan politics as other agencies and can therefore develop a good deal of power and authority
Examples:
Interstate Commerce Commission (1887)
* The first regulatory agency
* Tasked with regulating the railroad
The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (1974)
* regulates U.S. financial markets and the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), which regulates radio and television
Security and Exchange Commission (1934)
* Created after the Stock Market Crash of 1929
* Supervises the corporate sector, the capital market participants, the securities and investment instruments market, and the protection of the investing public
* SEC’s mission has expanded significantly in the digital era beyond mere regulation of stock floor trading
Executive Orders
An official directive from the U.S. president to federal agencies that often have much the same power of a law.
* They can be disputed in the courts.
* Do not carry the same finality as law
Implied Power
- The U.S. Constitution does not directly define or give the president authority to issue presidential actions, including executive orders
- Instead, this implied and accepted power derives from Article II of the Constitution
- The president “shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed.”
Executive Orders Function
- The president instructs the government how to work within the parameters already set by Congress and the Constitution
- In effect, this allows the president to push through policy changes without going through Congress
Lever of Executive Branch & Checks and Balances on Executive Orders
- By issuing an executive order, the President does not create a new law or appropriate any funds from the U.S. Treasury
- Only Congres has the power to do these things
Checks and Balances:
* A lower federal court can nullify (cancel) an executive order that is found to be unconstitutional
Example: President Trump’s Muslim travel ban
Executive Orders from President Truman & they have limits
- Directed Secretary of Commerce to take control of the country’s steel mills during the Korean War
- to prevent a steelworkers’ strike from shutting the down the mills and impacting the nation’s supply of steel (and ammunition)
Result:
* In Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer later that year, the Supreme Court ruled that Truman’s order violated the due process clause of the Constitution and that the president had not been given statutory authority
Judicial Powers of the President
- Reprieve - Delays a punishment
- Pardon - Release from a punishment and restoring one’s civil rights
- Commutation - Decreasing or reducing a judicial sentence
- Amnesty - A blanket pardon to a group of people facing prosecution
