1. To Be a President…

2. Rules of Succession 1947 Presidential Succession Act 25th Amendment
1-18
25th Amendment
President can name a Vice President if the VP resigns or dies
Your president if 17 other important people die at once

3. Formal Powers of the President
The Appointment Power
“Ambassadors, public ministers, consuls, judges of the Supreme Court, and other offices”
Over 3,000 appointments during a President’s term
Court appointments to the Supreme Court and federal bench give the president broad influence that lasts beyond his term in office
Appointing Cabinet members is not a
Constitutional Power of the President

4. Veto Power
President can reject any congressional legislation either through a general veto or a pocket veto
Types of Vetos
Pocket Veto
A special veto power exercised at the end of a legislative session whereby bills not signed by the chief executive die after a specified time
Constitution- If the president holds a bill for ten days without signing or vetoing it, the bill becomes a law if Congress is in session and is pocket vetoed if congress is out of session.
Line-Item Veto (UNCONSTITUTIONAL)
Used by most Governors in most states to veto sections of appropriations bills while signing the remainder of the bill into law
Clinton v. New York- UNCONSTITUIONAL FOR PRESIDENTS BASED ON ______________________
Veto- The entire law is ruled invalid. Can be overridden Congress with a 2/3rds vote.

5. Informal Power Executive Order
A rule or regulation passed by the President that has the effect of a law.
Power comes from precedents, custom, and constitutional interpretation
Emancipation Proclamation
New Deal
How we deal with “enemy combatants” freezing assets, interrogation, and due process rights
Recruiting and Hiring recent graduates
Threat of a Veto (informal power)
Historically there have been over 2,500 presidential vetoes…
About 100 have been overridden
You do the Math
I didn’t

6. The Power to Make Treaties
The President has the Power but 2/3rds of the Senate has to approve
Also President can receive Ambassadors
Also has the power to formally recognize the existence of a country
President Reagan and
Mikhail Gorbachev

7. Informal Power Executive Agreements Checks on Executive Agreements
Force of a treaty without the “Advice and Consent of the Senate”
Expires when a President Leaves office
Constitutional-Over 9,000 executive agreements and only 1300 treaties
WW2 Roosevelt traded 50 overage destroyers to Britain for air bases in western Britain
Checks on Executive Agreements
Expires when the president leaves office
Congress can choose not to fund the agreement

8. Power to Convene Congress
According to the Constitution the President MUST give a State of The Union

9. Pardoning Power Check on the Judiciary
Releases the Individual from the punishment or legal consequences from a crime. Restores all rights and privileges
Gerald Ford Pardoned Richard Nixon after the Watergate Scandal

10. Informal Power United States v. Nixon Executive Privilege
Executive Privilege does not extend to criminal matters
Clinton v. Reno
Executive Privilege does not extend to personal matters
Nixon v. Fitzgerald
The president can’t be sued for actions taken in office
Executive Privilege
The right of executive officials to refuse to appear before or to withhold information from a legislative committee or a court.

11. Number 1 Power of the President
Power of Persuasion
The ability to form a direct link between the executive office and the people
If you get the people on your side, then you get Congress on your side.