Transcript Government Institutions EXEC Branchx

GOVERNMENT
INSTITUTIONS
EXECUTIVE BRANCH
EXECUTIVE POWER
• Article II Section 1
The executive Power shall be vested in a
President of the United States of America. He shall
hold his Office during the Term of four Years, and,
together with the Vice President, chosen for the same
Term, be elected, as follows…
ELECTORAL COLLEGE
• Article II Section 1
Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the
Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors,
equal to the whole Number of Senators and
Representatives to which the State may be entitled in
the Congress: but no Senator or Representative, or
Person holding an Office of Trust or Profit under the
United States, shall be appointed an Elector.
ACTIVITY
• Electoral college
– Have students pick ¼ positions (four corners)
• Keep it
• Abolish it = popular/direct vote
• Change the winner take all to % of pop. Votes received in a state
• Award votes based by congressional districts and the overall winner of the state get the 2
votes of the senate
– List issues
– List possible fixes
– Be able to describe/explain how your position addresses the issues
Or
– why they are not issues, and why it should be that way
Also
– how/what fix(es) does your position offer
QUALIFICATIONS
• Article II Section 1
No Person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the
United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be
eligible to the Office of President; neither shall any Person be eligible to
that Office who shall not have attained to the Age of thirty five Years, and
been fourteen Years a Resident within the United States.
– Age ≥ 35 years
– Citizen of the U.S.
– Resident ≥ 14 years
PRESIDENTIAL OATH
• Article II Section 1
“I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute
the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of
my Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the
United States."
ACTIVITY
• http://www.kgw.com/news/local/more-than-half-of-arrested-anti-trump-protesters-didntvote/351964445
• You will work in groups to:
• Answer these questions:
– Are these people helping or hurting their cause/position?
– Based on their behavior and the fact that a majority of them didn’t vote and/or aren’t even
registered to vote, do they truly care or believe in their cause?
– If they wanted their voice to be heard/matter, what should they have done?
• And come up with at least three ways/ideas to increase voter turnout.
EXECUTIVE POWERS
• Article II Section II
– The President shall be Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of
the United States, and of the Militia of the several States
– he shall have Power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offences
against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment.
• Reprieve – lessen punishment
• Pardon – forgive or excuse
– He shall have Power, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, to make
Treaties, provided two thirds of the Senators present concur; and he shall nominate,
and by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint Ambassadors,
other public Ministers and Consuls, Judges of the supreme Court, and all other
Officers of the United States, whose Appointments are not herein otherwise
provided for
• Supreme Court
– Candidates are nominated by the President
– Candidates go before the Senate Judiciary Committee
– Candidates then go before the full Senate
– The President shall have Power to fill up all Vacancies that may happen during the
Recess of the Senate
• Washington appointed South Carolina judge John Rutledge as Chief Justice of
the United States during a congressional recess in 1795. Because of Rutledge's
political views and occasional mental illness, however, the Senate rejected his
nomination, and Rutledge attempted suicide and resigned.
EXECUTIVE POWERS
• Article II Section III
– He shall from time to time give to the Congress Information of
the State of the Union
– he may, on extraordinary Occasions, convene both Houses, or
either of them, and in Case of Disagreement between them,
with Respect to the Time of Adjournment, he may adjourn them
to such Time as he shall think proper
– he shall receive Ambassadors and other public Ministers; he shall
take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed, and shall
Commission all the Officers of the United States.
EXECUTIVE ORDERS
• Executive order – presidential directives that have the force of law without the
approval of congress
– This in an implied power
• Examples
– Abraham Lincoln and the Emancipation Proclamation
– FDR and the imprisonment of Japanese-Americans during WWII
– Ronald Reagan and the restriction of federal funding for organizations and
groups that support abortion.
• Bill Clinton reversed it
• George W. Bush reinstated it
• Obama renewed funding to for organizations and groups that support
abortion.
GROWTH OF PRESIDENTIAL POWER
• Inherent powers – powers not described in the constitution but that have been
claimed by presidents
• Inherent – existing innately, naturally, within or as part of the nature of a thing
• Examples
– Thomas Jefferson and the Louisiana Purchase in which the U.S. doubled its size
with land purchased from France
– Abraham Lincoln exercised prohibited powers such as the writ of habeas corpus
and jailed opponents of the union without trial or legal authority. He raised an
army without congress’s approval and took illegal action against the southern
states by blockading their ports.
– Theodore Roosevelt and the New Deal economic programs which expanded the
role of gov. in the economy
– George W. Bush declared substantially expanded gov. power to fight the “war on
terrorism.” Congress granted significant intelligence-gathering powers through
the Patriot Act. As a result, the government began collecting intel on it’s citizens.
ACTIVITY
• You will briefly research an executive order and write a short summary that answer these
questions:
– Which president issued the order?
– What did the order do?
– Was the order “good” or “bad?” Explain!!!
• We will do this Monday Dec. 5th. You will finish it that day in class!!!
IMPEACHMENT
• Article II Section IV
The President,Vice President and all civil Officers of the
United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and
Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and
Misdemeanors.
Impeachment requires:
I.
Formal accusation by the House of Representatives
II. Trial and conviction by the Senate
IMPEACHMENT
• Since 1797 the House of Representatives has impeached sixteen federal
officials.
• These include:
– two presidents
• Andrew Johnson
– Before Abraham Lincoln was assassinated in 1865, he had formulated a plan of reconstruction that would be lenient toward the
defeated South as it rejoined the Union. Andrew Johnson was intent on carrying out this plan when he assumed the presidency.
This policy, however, did not sit well with the so-called Radical Republicans in Congress, who wanted to set up military
governments and implement more stringent terms for readmission for the seceded states and neither side was willing to
compromise. The political backing to begin impeachment proceedings against the president came when Johnson breached the
Tenure of Office Act by removing Edwin Stanton, Secretary of War, from the cabinet. Both Lincoln and Johnson had experienced
problems with Stanton, an ally of the Radicals in Congress. Stanton's removal, therefore, was not only a political decision made to
relieve the discord between the president and his cabinet, but a test of the Tenure of Office Act as well. The Tenure of Office Act
was a United States federal law (in force from 1867 to 1887) that was intended to restrict the power of the President of the
United States to remove certain office-holders without the approval of the Senate.
• Bill Clinton
IMPEACHMENT
– a cabinet member
– a senator
• The first official
impeached in this country
was Senator William
Blount of Tennessee for a
plot to help the British
seize Florida from Spain in
1797.
The Loss of Florida:
Life continued in sparsely populated
Florida until 1763, when Spain gave the
colony to Great Britain in exchange for
Havana, which the British had recently
captured. In 1784 Britain returned Florida
to Spain. By then, however, a new,
expanding nation had formed to the norththe United States.
In the early 1800s, tensions rose along
the unguarded border between Spanish
Florida and the state of Georgia. These
tensions were exacerbated when the
Seminoles aided Great Britain against the
United States during the War of 1812 and
led to American military incursions into
northern Florida beginning in late 1814
during what became known as the First
Seminole War. As with earlier American
incursions into Florida, Spain protested this
invasion but could not defend its territory,
and instead opened diplomatic negotiations
seeking a peaceful transfer of land.
IMPEACHMENT
– a justice of the Supreme Courte
– eleven federal judges
• Judge John Pickering of New Hampshire was the first
impeached official actually convicted. He was found guilty of
drunkenness and unlawful rulings, on March 12, 1804, and was
believed to have been insane.
• Of those impeached, the Senate has convicted and removed
seven… all of them judges.
• Not included in this list are the office holders who have resigned
rather than face impeachment, most notably, President Richard M.
Nixon.
Men from Richard Nixon's administration involved:
• Former U.S. Attorney General John Mitchell, who was
running Nixon’s re-election committee
• White House Counsel John Dean
• White House Chief of Staff H.R. Haldeman
• White House Special Assistant on Domestic Affairs
John Ehrlichman
• President Nixon himself
Other people involved in the Watergate Scandal were the
Plumbers, a collection of operatives trained in security
and intelligence. The Plumbers included:
• Former CIA agents E. Howard Hunt Jr. and G. Gordon
Liddy
The two newspaper investigators who uncovered the
whole scandal were Washington Post reporters:
• Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein.
RICHARD NIXON
WATERGATE
The Watergate Scandal began on June 17, 1972, at the National Democratic Committee headquarters
in the Watergate apartment-office complex in Washington, D.C. when burglars were caught taking
photos of documents. The men were linked to the president's re-election committee. Four of the
burglars had CIA connections. Carl Bernstein was present at their arraignment, and these surprising
associations led to a Washington Post investigation. President Nixon's role in the Watergate break-in
was revealed in a tape from a June 1972 conversation with White House Chief of Staff H.R. Haldeman,
in which Nixon discussed a plan to have the CIA pressure the FBI to cease investigation of the
Watergate case. This led to Nixon’s decision to resign.
VICE PRESIDENT
• Constitutional Responsibilities
– Takes over presidency in case of presidential death or removal
from office
– Presides over the senate and votes in case of tie
SUCCESSION
1. Vice President
2. Speaker of the House
3. Pro tem of the Senate
4. All the secretaries of the various Cabinet departments
ORGANIZATION OF THE EXECUTIVE BRANCH
1. President and Vice President
2. Cabinet
1. Dept. of Agriculture
6. Dept. of Human Services
11. Dept. of Labor
2. Dept. of Commerce
7. Dept. of Homeland Security 12. Dept. of State
3. Dept. of Defense
8. Dept. of Urban Development 13. Dept. of Transportation
4. Dept. of Education
9. Dept. of Interior
14. Dept. of Treasury
5. Dept. of Energy
10. Dept. of Justice
15. Dept. of Veteran Affairs
3. Independent Agencies and Gov. Corps.
1. There are over 150 departments/agencies employing more than
2 million people
AGENCIES AND CORPORATIONS
Government corporations have the independence of a private businesses
but they are owned, sponsored or acquired by the government.
• Common examples of a government-owned corporations in the United
States:
– Postal Service (USPS)
– National Fish and Wildlife Foundation
– National Park Foundation,
– Bank of the United States (Federal Reserve)
– Peace Corps
– National Public Radio (NPR)
– Amtrak
HTTP://WWW.KGW.COM/NEWS/LOCAL/MORE
-THAN-HALF-OF-ARRESTED-ANTI-TRUMPPROTESTERS-DIDNT-VOTE/351964445
• Have students work in groups to create strategies teenagers can use to increase voter turnout
• Electoral college
– List issues
– List possible fixes
– Four corners strategy to have students pick ¼ positions
• Keep it
• Abolish it = popular/direct vote
• Change the winner take all to % of pop.Votes received in a state
• Award votes based by congressional districts and the overall winner of the state get the 2 votes of the
senate
– Be able to describe/explain how your position addresses the issues or why they are not issues and
why it should be that way, also, how/what fix(es) does your position offer