Executive Orders: Issuance, Modification, and Revocation

Executive orders, presidential memoranda, and proclamations are used extensively by Presidents to achieve policy goals, set uniform standards for managing the executive branch, or outline a policy view intended to influence the behavior of private citizens. The U.S. Constitution does not define these presidential instruments and does not explicitly vest the President with the authority to issue them. Nonetheless, such orders are accepted as an inherent aspect of presidential power. Moreover, if they are based on appropriate authority, they have the force and effect of law. This report discusses the nature of these written instruments, executive orders in particular, with a focus on the scope of presidential authority to execute such instruments, as well as judicial and congressional responses to their issuance

The Rhetoric and Reality of Regulatory Reform

In January 2007, President George W. Bush stirred up widespread controversy by issuing amendments to an executive order on regulatory review adopted initially by President Clinton. The Bush amendments variously require agencies to issue written regulatory problem statements, assign gate-keeping responsibilities to Regulatory Policy Officers within each agency, and undertake analytic reviews before adopting certain kinds of guidance documents. Both legal scholars and policy advocates charge that the Bush amendments place significant new burdens on administrative agencies and will delay the issuance of important new regulatory policies. This paper challenges the rhetorical claims of obstructionism that have emerged in response to the Bush amendments. It begins by comparing criticisms of the Bush amendments with criticisms of previous regulatory reforms, showing that concerns about delay date all the way back to the creation of the Administrative Procedure Act of 1946. Notwithstanding the perennial nature of charges of delay and obstruction, the U.S. regulatory state has grown dramatically in both size and impact over the last six decades. In addition, the extant social science literature has failed to find any systematic delays associated with the specific procedure affected by the Bush amendments, namely regulatory review by the Office of Management and Budget. Overall, the burdens associated with regulatory reforms appear to be far smaller, or more manageable, than critics usually suppose. This paper concludes with several explanations for persistent reality of regulatory growth in the face of the persistent rhetoric of obstruction. These alternative accounts not only help explain the rhetoric-reality divide over regulatory reform in general, but they also provide reason to expect the Bush amendments will have, at most, only a trivial impact on the overall regulatory process.

Intelligence Gathering and the Law: Conflict or Compatibility?

Article by Benjamin R. Civiletti, Attorney General of the United States (1979-1981), regarding the sensitivity and complexity of intelligence gathering. Document includes handwritten notes and was originally published in the Fordham Law Review.https://ir.lawnet.fordham.edu/events_programs_sonnet_articles/1002/thumbnail.jp

Congress to Administrative Agencies: Creator, Overseer, and Partner

Ultimately, all questions of administrative law, judicial review of agency action, and the degree of congressional oversight revolve around attempts to discover where the true congressional intent lies. All of our congressional oversight activities seek to advance an administrative agency outcome that most reflects congressional understanding of the dictates of law. In our system of government the non-legislative branches all pursue the same goal-determining and ultimately following congressional intent. The system affords each branch a great deal of leeway to pursue its own view of congressional intent, and naturally each branch seeks to assert its own perspective as much as possible. In the author\u27s opinion, from the vantage point of a congressional subcommittee chair, some views should be granted greater deference than others