The Illusion Of Presidential Government

Hugh Heclo, Lester M Salamon

• Publisher: Taylor & Francis
• Year: 2019
• eBook ISBN: 9781000302349
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: International Relations
• Index: Politics & International Relations

"Presidential government is an illusion. It is an image that misleads presidents no less than the media and the American public." Thus begins this realistic look at the presidency, in which nine leading presidential scholars examine how and why we are under the illusion of presidential government and ask such questions as: What is the president's actual role? What has happened to his traditional tools of executive leadership? How is the office of the president organized to deal with domestic, economic, and national security affairs? is federal regulation an area of potential power for the president? And, if "presidential government" is indeed a myth, what can be done to help the presidency play a more effective part in constitutional government? Each chapter probes a different facet of the image of presidential government by looking at the major operations of the modern presidency-from struggles with Congress for control of administrative detail to problems of managing the economy and national security. The book closes with the final report of the National Academy of Public Administration's Panel on Presidential Management. Not surprisingly, the authors do not always agree; nevertheless, they are united in the view that the managerial role of the president must be seen as a whole-and without illusions.

Part One
The Unwritten Constitution

Civics courses teach that the United States, unlike such countries as Britain, has a written constitution, in fact, it has both the written Constitution and an unwritten constitution. The legal document obviously shapes our political institutions, but so too do bodies of practice that have become established over time. Indeed, it is difficult to see how the written Constitution could work at all if such practical understandings did not allow us to "fill in between the lines" and to adapt to changing circumstances.

Two of the most important ambiguities in the written Constitution concern the working relations between the legislative and executive branches and the organizational content and operations of the president's own office. As Louis Fisher points out in Chapter 1, the designers of the Constitution at one time considered and then very wisely dropped the idea of spelling out in a constitutional amendment the separation of power among the branches of government. He goes on to show the justifications and means Congress uses to involve itself in government administration.

Fifty years ago the president's office consisted of little more than the presi-dent himself, two or three personal secretaries, and a small clerical staff. In Chapter 2 John Helmer outlines how far we have come since those days. A collection of presidential staffs now covers all areas of national policy. This presidential bureaucracy, which has grown with little overall intention or design, helps the presidency play an active part in hundreds of major and minor issues. By discussing a case study of a recent presidential decision, however, Helmer shows how easily this same bureaucracy can confuse, overextend, and complicate the president's leadership.

To understand how our unwritten constitution encompasses an active congressional role in administration and a growing problem for the president in managing his own bureaucracy is to begin to penetrate the illusion of presidential government.

1
Congress and the President in the Administrative Process: The Uneasy Alliance

Louis Fisher

The public administration school has been a steadfast opponent of congressional involvement in administrative matters. Part of the resistance is constitutional. Congress enacts the laws; it should let the executive carry them out. It is also argued, on a more practical level, that waste, confusion, and loss of accountability result when administration is divided between two branches of government. Both themes find expression in a veto message delivered by Woodrow Wilson in 1920.

The Congress and the Executive should function within their respective spheres. Otherwise, efficient and responsible management will be impossible and progress impeded by wasteful forces of disorganization and obstruction. The Congress has the power and the right to grant or deny an appropriation, or to enact or refuse to enact a law, but once an appropriation is made or a law is passed the appropriation should be administered or the law executed by the executive branch of the Government.¹

Wilson invoked a dream that no one has been able to transform into reality. At no point in our history have we with any precision, success, or permanence separated the functions of government into legislative and executive. This ideal model eludes our grasp at every turn. It creates attitudes and expectations that infect the relationships between the branches, producing a steady stream of recriminations and countercharges. Underneath the Wilsonian legislative/administrative dichotomy we often find "a concealed but deep distrust of democratic government and of democratic processes."²

The question is not whether Congress will or should participate in administrative matters. Both the formal structure of government and the informal dynamics of politics necessitate the active involvement of Congress. The undecided issue is whether legislative involvement will take place in an atmosphere of cooperation and mutual respect or in a climate of ill will and acrimony.

The Framers' Search for Efficient Management

The record of the Continental Congress from 1774 to 1787 contains a vast number of poignant stories about administrative experiments and managerial failures. Members of the Congress tried to handle the full range of government business-administrative and adjudicative as well as legislative. Not surprisingly, vital issues were neglected or mismanaged. Under pressure to make operations more efficient and reliable, Congress farmed out administrative duties first to committees, then to boards staffed by men recruited from outside Congress, and finally, in 1781, to single executives. "It is positively pathetic," wrote one scholar, "to follow Congress through its aimless wanderings in search of a system for the satisfactory management of its executive departments."³

Compiaints about administrative deficiencies run like a connecting thread throughout these years. James Madison's interest in three branches of government was drawn more from the administrative record of the Continental Congress than from the theoretical writings of Montesquieu. Prior to the Philadelphia convention he confided to his friend and close associate, Thomas Jefferson, that Congress had mismanaged its powers under the Articles of Confederation and that even more demanding duties would be thrust upon the new national government. Administrative details, he said, would be best left to a separate executive. Alexander Hamilton voiced a widely held sentiment in 1780 when he said that Congress had "meddled too much with details of every sort." Congress was properly a "deliberative corps and it forgets itself when it attempts to play the executive." While proceedings were under way at the Philadelphia convention, Jefferson remarked that nothing was "so embarrassing nor so mischievous in a great assembly as the details of execution."⁴

These statements suggest that the framers could distinguish "executive" from "legislative," allocating these two functions to separate branches. In fact, the framers decided on an intermixture of powers. In No. 47 of the Federalist Papers, Madison argued that the theory of separated powers had been totally misconceived. It did not mean that the departments "ought to have no partial agency in, or no control over, the acts of the other." Paradoxically, the powers created by the Constitution had to overlap to keep the departments separate and independent. Madison drove the point home in Federalist 48: "Unless these departments be so far connected and blended as to give each a constitutional control over the others, the degree of separation which the maxim requires, as essential to a free government, can never in practice be duly maintained." The pure theory of separated powers gave way to the system of checks and balances we know today.

Some of the delegates at the state ratifying conventions were shocked by the extent to which the Constitution had mingled the branches. "How is the executive?" cried one delegate at the Virginia ratifying convention. "Contrary to the opinion of all the best writers, blended with the legislative. We have asked for bread, and they have given us a stone."⁵

Virginia joined North Carolina and Pennsylvania in demanding that a separation clause be added to the national bill of rights. Because of their efforts, Congress considered the following language: "The powers delegated by this constitution are appropriated to the departments to which they are respectively distributed: so that the legislative department shall never exercise the powers vested in the executive or judicial[,] nor the executive exercise the powers vested in the legislative or judicial, nor the judicial exercise the powers vested in the legislative or executive departments." The House and the Senate later agreed to delete this amendment from the list of twelve sent to the states for ratification.⁶

Had this language been adopted, it could have served only a hortatory function, warning each branch not to encroach upon the other. It could not have prevented Congress from delegating legislative powers to the president, from investigating corruption and waste within the agencies, or from exercising its specific constitutional powers to control and direct the executive branch. This supervisory power is derived from the power of the purse, Senate confirmation of appointees, statutory specifications for agency personnel, periodic hearings by congressional committees, audits by the General Accounting Office, informal contacts, and the general power under Article I to make all laws necessary and proper for carrying into execution not only the enumerated powers of Congress but all other powers vested in the government or in any department or officer. Newer techniques have been added to oversee administrative action, including the various forms of legislative vetoes and nonstatutory controls.

Conditions for Legislative Participation

The public administration school adopts the following model of the Constitution: The president functions as the chief administrative officer of a unified and hierarchical executive branch, capable of issuing authoritative commands to his subordinates in the agencies and departments. To preserve the principles of unity and responsibility, the president relies on his removal power to dismiss ineffective or disloyal employees. A competing model begins with the premise that Congress creates the departments and may specify the conditions under which laws are to be carried out. Executive departments serve more as the agent of Congress than of the president.

Both models have a legitimate place in our governmental system. One cannot override the other; efforts must be made to reconcile them. Presidents and their assistants need to appreciate that Congress is entitled to intervene in many administrative matters and is constitutionally empowered to direct a broad range of decisions by departments and agencies. Congress invites suggestions from administrators on pending legislation without raising questions of separation of powers. The record is equally clear that administrators can benefit from legislative input. The political process must accommodate traffic in both directions. If the congressional effort is discredited by using such epithets as "meddling" and "interference," members of Congress will brace themselves for an uphill battle and employ obstructive techniques of their own. An incoming president and his staff need to understand the conditions that motivate members of Congress to intervene in administrative matters. Many of the conditions relate to deficiencies within the executive branch and are therefore susceptible to presidential control or influence. Other interventions are reasonably drawn from the constitutional responsibilities of Congress. Keeping a sharp eye on these factors is more productive and enlightening than issuing broadsides about congressional "encroachments" or "usurpations." Rarely does Congress intervene for idle or frivolous purposes. Some members do act on short-term, cynical, and irresponsible impulses, permitting the politics of the moment to take precedence over managerial effectiveness, but it is unfair to apply this characterization to Congress as a whole. The bulk of congressional activity in questions of administration is legitimate and defensible.

Constitutional Stakes

The Brownlow Committee found that the effectiveness of the president in 1937 was "limited and restricted, in spite of the clear intent of the Constitution to the contrary." In recommending that administrative duties be centered under the president to restore accountability, and in trying to subject the independent commissions to presidential control, the committee constructed an ina...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• List of Tables
• Preface
• The Contributors
• List of Abbreviations
• Introduction: The Presidential Illusion
• Part One The Unwritten Constitution
• Part Two Process Management
• Part Three Policy Management
• Appendix
• Index
• About the Book and Editors