236 PART THREE • insTiTuTions of AmERiCAn GovERnmEnT
Executive Order
A rule or regulation issued
by the president that has
the effect of law.
Federal Register
A publication of the U.S.
government that prints
executive orders, rules, and
regulations.
Executive Privilege
The right of executive
officials to withhold
information from, or to
refuse to appear before, a
legislative committee or
a court.action.^14 According to legal scholars, this was the first time a
limit had been placed on the exercise of the president’s emer-
gency powers.Executive orders
Congress allows the president (as well as administrative agen-
cies) to issue executive orders that have the force of law.
These executive orders can do the following: (1) enforce leg-
islative statutes, (2) enforce the Constitution or treaties with
foreign nations, and (3) establish or modify rules and practices
of executive administrative agencies.
An executive order, then, represents the president’s leg-
islative power. The only apparent requirement is that under
the Administrative Procedure Act of 1946, all executive orders
must be published in the Federal Register, a daily publication
of the U.S. government. Executive orders have been used to
implement national affirmative action regulations; to restruc-
ture the White House bureaucracy; and under emergency con-
ditions, to ration consumer goods and administer wage and
price controls. They have also been used to classify government
information as secret, to regulate the export of restricted items,
and to establish military tribunals for suspected terrorists.Executive Privilege
Another inherent executive power that has been claimed by
presidents concerns the right of the president and the presi-
dent’s executive officials to withhold information from, or
refuse to appear before, Congress or the courts. This is called
executive privilege, and it relies on the constitutional separa-
tion of powers for its basis.invoking Executive Privilege. Presidents have frequently
invoked executive privilege to avoid having to disclose infor-
mation to Congress about actions of the executive branch.
Executive privilege rests on the assumption that a certain degree of secrecy is essential to
national security. Critics of executive privilege believe that it can be used to shield from
public scrutiny actions of the executive branch that should be open to Congress and to
the American citizenry.limiting Executive Privilege. Limits to executive privilege went untested until the
Watergate affair in the early 1970s. Five men had broken into the headquarters of the
Democratic National Committee and were caught searching for documents that might
damage the candidacy of the Democratic nominee, George McGovern. Later investigation
showed that the break-in had been planned by members of Richard Nixon’s campaign
committee and that Nixon and his closest advisers had devised a strategy for impeding the
investigation of the crime. After it became known that all conversations held in the Oval- Youngstown Sheet and Tube Co. v. Sawyer, 343 U.S. 579 (1952).
President George W. Bush gives
a State of the Union address while Vice President Dick
Cheney listens. Where is that address given? (AP Photo/
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