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The Law: Textbooks and the President's Constitutional Powers
Author(s) -
ADLER DAVID GRAY
Publication year - 2005
Publication title -
presidential studies quarterly
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.337
H-Index - 5
eISSN - 1741-5705
pISSN - 0360-4918
DOI - 10.1111/j.1741-5705.2005.00254.x
Subject(s) - presidential system , executive power , political science , state (computer science) , power (physics) , law , confusion , separation of powers , government (linguistics) , constitutional law , politics , psychology , computer science , linguistics , philosophy , physics , algorithm , quantum mechanics , psychoanalysis
For many college students, enrollment in an introductory course on American government and politics will constitute their only detailed orientation to U.S. constitutional principles. What they read in introductory textbooks about presidential power will significantly inform and shape their understanding of the authority wielded by the nation's chief executive. How do introductory texts portray the president's constitutional powers? This essay argues that textbooks pay insufficient attention to the source and limits of presidential authority. Moreover, descriptions of executive powers are apt to leave students in a state of confusion. In view of all this, students as citizens are ill‐equipped to assess and evaluate sweeping assertions of executive power. As a consequence, it will be difficult for citizens to check presidential abuses of power.