Presidential Power

• Institutional Sources of Presidential Power– Powers enumerated in Constitution

• Behavioral or Individual Sources of Presidential Power– Power of Persuasion- Neustadt– Importance of Personality- Barber– Going Public- Kernell

Institutional Sources of Presidential Power

• Chief of State (symbolic/ceremonial roles)• Chief Executive (appointment power,

control over executive branch/executing laws)

• Commander-in-Chief• Chief Diplomat• Chief Legislator (recommending

legislation, executive orders, veto/signing legislation)

Individual Sources of Presidential Power

• Power of Persuasion– Richard Neustadt - Presidential Power and

the Modern Presidents

• Importance of Personality– James Barber – Presidential Character

• “Going Public”– Samuel Kernell – Going Public

Neustadt and Presidential Power

• Way to persuade is to convince members of Congress that what the W.H. wants of them is what they ought to do for their own sake and on their authority

• Power of persuasion is the power to bargain

• Key is a bargaining game

Neustadt Continued

• All of the players have different advantages:• President- status of office, public standing (if

high), veto, appointments, budget• Bureaucracy- since also beholden to Congress,

will not necessarily go along with what Executive wants

• Congress- hold purse strings, approve appointments

• Public- only important in approval of President and to prove that the actor cares about an issue

Barber – Presidential Character

• Personality plays an important role in shaping presidential behavior

• Will affect whether president has persuasion powers

• Two Important dimensions:– Active/Passive- Energy towards Government

or what Government should do– Negative/Positive- How feel about the job

Barber - Typology of 4 Types

• Active-Positive– High self esteem, oriented towards results,

adaptive– Examples- Kennedy, Truman, and FDR

• Active-Negative– Intense effort with low emotional reward,

motivated by personal ambition-– Examples- Johnson and Nixon

Barber - Typology of 4 Types

• Passive-Positive– Try to please others, compliant with decisions by

others– Example- Reagan

• Passive-Negative– Minimal Performance, low self esteem, work out of

sense of duty– Example- Washington, Eisenhower?

• Where would we place Clinton or George W. Bush?

Kernell – Going Public

• Definition– Strategy of appealing to the public to get

Congress to do what the President Wants

• Examples– Clinton and Health Care Reform – George W. Bush and the Homeland Security

Bill

• Evidence for its Importance– Public addresses, travel, speeches

Going Public vs. Bargaining

• Why does Going public violate bargaining model?– Rarely includes the kind of exchanges in

bargaining theory– No benefits to members from complying with

the President- only costs if don’t comply– Entails public posturing- makes compromise

difficult– Undermines the legitimacy of other politicians

Why Growth of Going Public?

• Growth of the welfare state– Constituencies outside of D.C.

• Modern Communications– President in News everyday– Easier to mobilize public opinion

• Decline of Political Parties- Divided Government– Hard to bargain with individual members,

especially if different party

Implications of Going Public

• Congress will only listen if the President has high levels of approval (50% at least)

• Constant Campaign to Sway Voters

• Every White House since Carter has had an in-house pollster– Constantly track public approval of President

and opinion over the issues

Evaluation of Theories of Presidential Power

• Presidents clearly have institutional power– However, the use of these powers have

varied over time

• Most political scientists think that Barber’s “presidential character/personality” measure is no good

• Going public vs. Bargaining