Presidential Studies Quarterly articles from September 2005

Presidential Studies Quarterly archives from September 2005

Unilateral powers: a brief overview.(INTRODUCTION)
September 1, 2005... To advance their policy agenda, presidents have two options. They can submit proposals to Congress and hope that its members faithfully shepherd bills into laws; or they can exercise their unilateral powers--issuing such directives as executive...

The president and international commitments: treaties as signaling devices.
September 1, 2005... U.S. presidents can choose the form of international agreements that they negotiate. Using the Constitution's Article II procedure to gain ratification of a formal treaty is a costly and time-consuming endeavor, so presidents frequently turn to...

Judicial review of the war power.
September 1, 2005... The terrorist attacks of 9/11, followed by the creation of a military tribunal, treatment of detainees, and passage of the USA Patriot Act, brought to the fore again the question of what role federal courts should play in policing the war...

Staffing alone: unilateral action and the politicization of the Executive Office of the President, 1988-2004.
September 1, 2005... There is a burgeoning literature on unilateral action (see, e.g., Cooper 2002; Howell 2003; Mayer 2001). This literature frequently assumes that once orders are written, they are implemented without difficulty. As students of the policy process...

George W. Bush, Edgar Allan Poe, and the use and abuse of presidential signing statements.
September 1, 2005... As President George W. Bush approached the beginning of his second term, national news media speculated as to why he had not been willing to use his veto power and whether he would be forced to do so with the new Congress. When he threatened...

The last one hundred days.(of presidential campaigns)
September 1, 2005... A lame duck President might look at his authority to govern in the transition period as if it were a large balloon with a slow leak.... The balloon is ineluctably shrinking with each passing week.... By the end of the year, he will have lost...

The Contemporary Presidency: Condoleezza Rice as NSC advisor: a case study of the honest broker role.
September 1, 2005... "We need to plan as if things won't go well." --George W. Bush, September 25, 2001 (Woodward 2002, 136) "I want to know what the options are. A president cannot decide and make rational decisions unless I understand the feasibility of...

Elections: party identification in the 2004 election.
September 1, 2005... Background Since Belknap and Campbell tied the concept of party identification to political behavior in 1951 (Belknap and Campbell 1951), party affiliation has played a central role in explanations of individual political behavior in the...

The law: scholarly support for presidential wars.
September 1, 2005... War Powers in a Republic The Framers gave close thought on where to locate the war power. They knew that British precedents, on which they relied extensively in so many areas, assigned all of external affairs--including the war power--to...

President Clinton's memoirs: caveat emptor.(My Life)(Book Review)
September 1, 2005... My Life. By Bill Clinton. New York: Knopf, 2004. 957 pp. The public buys presidential memoirs to get the inside story. Scholars, who generally know more of the details of an administration, do so as well. Presidents, though, write their...

Command of Office: How War, Secrecy, and Deception Transformed the Presidency from Theodore Roosevelt to George W. Bush.(Book Review)
September 1, 2005... Command of Office: How War, Secrecy, and Deception Transformed the Presidency, from Theodore Roosevelt to George W. Bush. By Stephen Graubard. New York: Basic Books, 2004. 722 pp. "Don't judge a book by its cover" remains sage advice for...

The Illusion of Public Opinion: Fact and Artifact in American Public Opinion Polls.(Book Review)
September 1, 2005... The Illusion of Public Opinion: Fact and Artifact in American Public Opinion Polls. By George F. Bishop. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, 2005. 223 pp. It has become commonplace to speak of "public opinion" as if it were a concrete...

Writing JFK: Presidential Rhetoric and the Press in the Bay of Pigs Crisis.(Book Review)
September 1, 2005... Writing JFK: Presidential Rhetoric and the Press in the Bay of Pigs Crisis. By Thomas W. Benson. College Station: Texas A&M University Press, 2004. xix, 129 pp. It is rare that the photograph on the cover of a book so nicely evokes its...

Jacqueline Kennedy, First Lady of the New Frontier.(Book Review)
September 1, 2005... Jacqueline Kennedy, First Lady of the New Frontier. By Barbara A. Perry. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2004. 270 pp. Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis, even four decades after leaving the White House and one decade after her death,...

Inside the Pentagon Papers.(Book Review)
September 1, 2005... Inside the Pentagon Papers. Edited by John Prados and Margaret Pratt Porter. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2004. xii, 248 pp. When Daniel Ellsberg leaked the secret Pentagon study on the Vietnam War to the New York Times in 1971 in...

Governor Reagan: His Rise to Power.(Book Review)
September 1, 2005... Governor Reagan: His Rise to Power. By Lou Cannon. New York: Public Affairs, 2003. xii, 599 pp. Lou Cannon's latest book is mistitled. All the better for both the specialist and the presidential junkie alike, because Cannon has produced a...

Impeaching Clinton: Partisan Strife on Capitol Hill.(Book Review)
September 1, 2005... Impeaching Clinton: Partisan Strife on Capitol Hill. By Nicol C. Rae and Colton C. Campbell. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2004. 234 pp. This authoritative treatment of the partisan aspects of the Clinton impeachment is specific in...

In His Father's Shadow: The Transformations of George W. Bush.(Book Review)
September 1, 2005... In His Father's Shadow: The Transformations of George W, Bush. By Stanley A. Renshon. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004. 292 pp. It is not difficult to imagine an outcome of the 2000 election in which Al Gore garnered the modest number of...