Реферат: Imperial Presidency Overview Essay Research Paper Imperial

made over this issue when writing the final draft. The spirit of compromise

amongst the founders was what provided a viable and secure base for the future

of the presidency.

After his discussion of the founders, Schlesinger shifts to the

president’s powers of war. He analyzes every war, excluding the Revolution, that

the United States has participated in up to and including the war in Vietnam. He

discusses the specifics of each scenario and the way in which the president

handles it. Schlesinger develops the slowly growing power of the presidency by

recounting the actions that the president carried out on his own as well as

those that required the consent of Congress to be accomplished. As time

progressed, Schlesinger made note of all the major events that increased and

decreased the power of the presidency. For example, he discusses the almost

dictatorial power of Lincoln during the Civil War and then the impeachment of

Andrew Johnson shortly thereafter. These are two events that are indicative of

the seesaw struggle between the presidency and Congress. Schlesinger goes on to

discuss additional examples of conflict between the presidency and Congress such

as the dominance of Congress during the late 1800’s, the annexation of Texas,

the Great Depression, W.W.II, the Korean War, and the war in Vietnam.

Schlesinger focuses a great deal of attention on the events of the

twentieth century, because, in part, this was when the power of the presidency

vaulted to the level that it currently maintains. The reason for this, in

addition to what the early presidents had done, was that the government was

growing fast and the role of the government was increasing. There were many gray

areas in which the president could extend his power. The power of the president

to make war as Commander in Chief is an example of a gray area where the

presidency was able to gain much power. Schlesinger discusses how the president

was able to gain power through the clause in the Constitution that gives the

president the power to mobilize the military, without the consent of Congress,

in the name of national defense. This clause allowed the president to deploy