The Constitution of the United States of America envisages the existence of three shutters of the capacity: the executive, the legislature and the legal one. The president of the United States is the chief of the executive power.
There exists a complex system of control and balance (“checks and balances”) between these three capacities. Thus the president selects the candidates at the governmental stations (executive) but their nomination depends on the Sénat (legislative). In the same way for the judges of the Supreme court (legal). Conversely, the Congrès (legislative) has a right of opposition (majority of two thirds of the Chambre of the representatives and Sénat) with a veto of the president. It can also engage an impeachment (impeachment) of the president. The Supreme court (legal) can, it, to declare unconstitutional a law suggested by the president or the Room of the representatives.
The president is elected every four years (generally in bissextile end of the year) by the indirect vote for all. Its mandate begins on January 20th from the following year and lasts four years (before 1937 the presidential mandate began on March 4th). It can be represented for a second mandate.
Capacities of the president
the president, Head of State
The president, Head of State, are the symbol of the unit of the Nation. It ensures the continuity and the permanence of the State. The practice of the “ Lame Duck ” (the outgoing president remains in functions while the president lately elected organizes his come to power) goes in this direction. Lastly, the president lends oath “to safeguard, protect and defend the Constitution”.
the president, with the head of the American diplomacy
As a Head of State, the president is with the head of the American Diplomatie. No doubt Truman went too much far when he had affirmed “that he made the foreign politics”, but it is true that the Constitution allots a certain number of capacities to the president, conferring the role of “supreme diplomat to him” (Chief Diplomat). It is, in other words, the representative of the Nation abroad.
the symbol of the national unit
The president is the symbol of the unit of the country and his voice, single, and this on two accounts: such an amount of towards the interior (and the role of the president at the time of the great national tragedies is determining) that towards outside. One will note thus that the last visits of president George W. Bush in Europe have, each time, caused grinds speculations around the state of the transatlantic relations. The symbol which sticks to the presidential figure is particularly strong; it is enough for that to see the weight of the former presidents in the American diplomacy, as attests of them the multiple functions occupied by the president Jimmy Carter (outside - from where its Nobel Prize - as inside, when it chairs a commission on the presidential election in 2004-2005), or the tandem Bush-father Clinton made up following the Tsunami of December 2004 in Southeast Asia.
recognition of the States
The president names the Ambassadeur S and other representatives of the State, and it receives the diplomats who are accredited near him. The presidents considered that this last provision conferred the capacity to them to recognize - or not - the foreign States. In the respect of the parallelism of the forms, the president thus has logically the capacity to put a term at the diplomatic relations with a State, as that was the case with Cuba or Iran. He can also limit himself to point out an ambassador, to mark a dissension. The symbolic system of such a gesture is strong, and yet, in this field, the Senate does not have any other to be able but that to endorse the choice of the ambassador.
capacity to negotiate the treaties
The president has the capacity to negotiate and conclude - subject to ratification by the senators - treated S. It should be noted moreover that the presidents took the practice to conclude from the “agreements in simplified form” (executive agreements) which have value of international treaty in American internal rights without having the form of it.
the commander-in-chief of the armed forces
Pursuant to article 2, section 2 of the Constitution, the president is commander-in-chief of the armed and the national guard when it is with the service of the United States of America. It is thus with the head of the army and “for this reason has the initiative and the control of military operations”.
the defense of the territory
In times of peace, the president, commander-in-chief of the armed forces, can use of his capacity to maintain the order, even to restore it, at the request of a federate State. Consequently, the president could when necessary - because in theory it depends on the governor of the State - requisition the National guard, like made Eisenhower in Arkansas in 1957 (to counter the school segregation in Little Rock), Kennedy in the Mississippi and in Alabama in 1962 and 1963 for similar reasons or George W. Bush in the fight against terrorism - heard in an extensive way, since forces of the National guard are currently in operation in the Middle East and in Balkans.
the engagement of the troops
In spite of the existence of a constitutional provision stating that it is with the Congress that returns the responsibility of declare the war (article I, section 8), and in spite of the adoption in 1973 of the law on the capacities of war (War Powers Act), the capacity to send the troops to the combat is allocated de facto to the president. Although this presidential practice is highly disputed, it remains that a distinction was established between the capacity to make the war and that of declaring.
right of reprieve of the president
The president, following the example majority of the Heads of State, has the right of reprieve for the federal crimes, out of the case of impeachment. Thus, the president can gracier, to commute sentences - with or without condition - or to proclaim a Amnistie.
the president, head of government
Rise of the Welfare state, and with him the multiplication of the departments, the ministries and the administrations, increased by as much the capacity of the president, invited to direct a number increasingly vaster of fields and people. So the president enjoys a vast autonomous lawful capacity. And in this direction, the Supreme court played a determining role: it indeed worked out a broad interpretation of attributions of the president by affirming that the capacity to carry out the laws was nothing if the president were not equipped with the means necessary to do it.
the president, with the head of the administration
The president directs the American Administration and with this intention, it has a broad capacity of nomination that the practice matches of a capacity of revocation.
capacity of nomination of the president
The president names the public ambassadors, ministers, the consuls, the judges with the Supreme court, and all the other civils servant of the United States whose nomination is not envisaged by the present Constitution, whose stations will be created by the law. It will have then to obtain the confirmation of the Senate. At the end of the XIXe century, for purposes to put a term at corruption, the Congress voted the “Civilian Act Service”, in 1883, restricting the discrétionnaire capacity (without senatorial sanction) of nomination of the president at the highest stations of the administration, which accounts for today approximately 10% of the stations of the federal administration. The remainder of the nominations is done subject to confirmation by the Senate.
capacity of revocation of the president
Being based again on the principle of the parallelism of the procedures, Washington matched - just like did it at the time of other chiefs of the executive, in other countries - the capacity of nomination of a capacity of revocation.
the president, “legislator”
Pursuant to the theory of the separation of the capacities (Locke, Montesquieu), the legislative function is exerted by the Congress, and the executive function by the President. The Constitution does not give any legislative competence to the President. However, the President can influence the legislative program of the Congress. Its influence comes from its essential statute in the mode and will be able to be exerted at the time of the annual speech (" right of message") of the President in front of the Congress (" speech on the State of Union". According to a practice which one observes in many contemporary democracies, it is very often with the executive power that returns the essence of the initiative of the laws. It is thus the case in the United States where the president is, de facto, at the origin of the majority of the bills which the Congress examines (See the chapter on the Congress).
the right to veto
The president has also faculty to prevent since it can, pursuant to the article Ier section 7 of the Constitution, to return a legal text subjected to his signature. The Constitution provides that, if the president does not affix his veto with a bill in the ten days - wrought - following his transmission, this project becomes law. On the other hand, it can return the text to the rooms by asking a new reading. This veto can be reversed by a majority of two thirds in each room. However this is only one veto itself which remains very little used in the United States; another veto, more particular exists indeed: It is about the " Pocket véto". This particular form of the veto exists only in the United States. Explanations: If the bill is presented less than 10 days before the end of the session of the Congress then the President can decide not to answer the project, this one will then be promulgated later, at the time of the following session.
capacity of execution of the laws
The president carries out the laws. With this intention, it thus has a lawful capacity of application.
Election of the President
detailed Article: the United States, presidential election The President of the east United States elected by the vote for all indirect . That means that the voters do not vote for the president but for a Great Elector. It is the large college, formed of the whole of the Great Electors (college off the great electors), which elects the president.This method raises questions, but that the United States is a formed federation of States, these should be remembered are 13 states which were linked in 1776 and the founding fathers sought to ensure a balance between the equality of the whole of the States between them and the weight proportional to the population of the latter. With the Congress, this compromise was reached by having a House of Commons (House off Representative) where each State has representatives in proportion to the population and a Senate where each State has two senators whatever his population. To preserve this spirit of balance between the equality of the States and the equality of the citizens, the founding fathers imagined this indirect voting system.
Each State is entitled to two Great Electors plus a certain number in proportion to the population of the State. Territories as the District of Columbia (the town of Washington) are entitled also to a certain number of Great Electors. The State of Vermont has right only to three Great Electors (minimum) while Florida has of them 25 and the largest States (California, Texas, New York) have some even more.
Practice called “winner takes all” (gaining it all the setting collects) made so that the Great Electors coming from a State vote in block for the candidate who received the most votes in this State.
In 2000, the democratic candidate Al Gore obtained more votes than his republican adversary George W. Bush. In term of voice to the large college, it missed 25 votes with Bush to be elected and only one vote with Gore, whereas everyone was on standby results in Florida. Gore had gained the great States (California, New York) by comfortable majorities (Texas had of course gone to Bush) but Florida, with 25 Great Electors in the balance, was gained by Bush with a narrow majority (approximately 500 votes) in an atmosphere of great confusion (machines to be voted not highly reliable, suspension of the manual calculation of the votes on order of the governor of the State, the brother of Bush). In fine , the 25 votes went to Bush who gained the election by a voice of majority to the large college.
In 2004, on the other hand, the re-election of Bush gave place to the greatest number of popular votes of the electoral history américaineet confirmed an extreme polarization of the electoral map of the country according to the colors of the States.
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