There is a commonly held belief that it doesn’t matter who the president of the United States is because they hold very little actual power. It is a general sentiment about not only the President but politicians in general. Many hold the belief that all politicians are beholden to special interest groups and that both sides of the political spectrum are interchangeable despite the belief that the President holds little power, it is a fact the president holds quite a large amount of power. These powers include various executive powers, appointing over 4,000 positions in the federal government, and the power to direct the armed forces as commander-in-chief. The reality of the immense powers that the President and the executive branch holds contradicts the general sentiment that the President doesn’t actually have much power.
Even before the president is sworn into office, during the transitional period, the president and his staff are tasked with filling approximately 4,000 federal government positions Approximately, only 1,400 of those positions requires senate confirmation These positions include high level cabinet positions, heads of various federal agencies, and diplomatic ambassadorships. These are positions that execute and greatly influence the policy direction of the country it is true that the executive branch and the president of the United States is not a dictatorship and their powers are limited. Ultimately, many legislative efforts need to pass through both chambers of Congress in the form of a bill and needs to be upheld as lawful by the judicial branch. While the executive branch‘s power is limited, it does have veto power. A bill that is approved by both chambers of congress does not become law until it reaches the desk of the President and is officially signed into law.
The president can veto any bill that he feels unfit to become law and that veto can only be overridden if both chambers of congress reach a two-thirds majority supporting the bill in question Less than 10% of vetoes by presidents have been overridden by congress in US history During the Obama presidency, there have been several Obamacare repeal bills that have reached the president’s desk and were vetoed every single time. Article II of the Constitution gives the president a “grant of executive power,” This power gives the president power to give an executive order that bypasses congressional input Congress’ only power to stop an executive order is to pass a bill defunding the action that the executive order takes, but that bill can simply be vetoed by the president. Some examples of executive orders include Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation, Truman’s integration of the armed forces in 1948, and Obama’s executive order in 2012 that blocked the deportation of illegal immigrants who entered the United States as children.
One of the major powers bestowed upon the President by Article II of the Constitution is the use of military force. Article I gives Congress the power to declare war, but once war is declared, the president is given broad power on how the military will conduct that war. Despite this interpretation that requires Congress to declare war, it hasn’t prevented the executive branch to start wars without congressional authorization. Truman entered the United States into the Korean war without congressional authorization claiming it was a “police action” to thwart communism Lyndon B Johnson used the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution to justify the US entry into Vietnam. It has been generally understood since the Korean War that executive power to use military force does not require congressional authorization when it involves the defense of US interests and when the military action does not constitute what our general understanding of what a traditional war is.
The president of the United States is often said to be the leader of the free world. Depending on who you ask, that belief tends to swivel between that and the president being a powerless figurehead. While the legislative andjudicial branch does keep checks on the president‘s powers, it remains that the executive branch does hold large amounts of power. These include appointing thousands of positions in the federal government and various executive powers that include the ability to wage war without congressional authorization. When the power of the president and the executive branch is assessed, it becomes very clear that the president of the United States is in fact the most powerful and influential position in the world.
