Charles Krauthammer Quotes

The Senate should refuse to confirm nominees who do not take Congressional power seriously.

As a member of Congress, I believe Congress must provide oversight of actions by the Executive Branch as our system of checks and balances requires.

I was only one-half the appointing power. I nominated, but the Senate confirmed.

The most important benefit that I can confer on the country by my Presidency is to insist upon the entire independence of the executive and legislative branches of government

Legislative power is always superior to the executive.

The Executive is a co-ordinate and independent branch of the Government equally with the Senate; and I have yet to learn under what constitutional authority that branch of the Legislature has a right to require of my an account of any communication ... made to the heads of departments ...

The Senate is not a rubber stamp!

Congress no longer declares war or makes budgets. So that's the end of the constitution as a working machine.

The judicial branch of the government is the least dangerous because … it has no influence over either the sword or the purse.

There are checks and balances and broad separation of powers under the Constitution. Each organ of the State, i.e. the legislature, the executive and the judiciary, must have respect for the others and not encroach into each other's domain.

It matters enormously to a successful democratic society like ours that we have three branches of government, each with some independence and some control over the other two. That's set out in the Constitution.

The framers of our Constitution thought it was of critical, critical importance, in establishing three branches of government, that we have an independent judiciary. Therefore was that without that, the provisions of the constitution couldn’t be enforced

Government is not a bottom line enterprise. You can get yourself elected ... but you can't fire the legislature if they won't do what you want.

The difference between the departments undoubtedly is, that the legislature makes, the executive executes, and the judiciary construes the law.

The republic has been structured to guard against the cabals of a few as well as against confusion of a multitude, but how each House of Congress would maintain that balance was left to the discretion of the two bodies.

Separation of powers means that the president cannot control Congress.

The imperial Presidency requires a passive Congress.

You run Washington DC though the House. The Senate gets in the way. The President gets in the way.

An attorney general has to stand up [to the President], and sometimes he will be replaced.

Federal bureaucracies are creatures of Congress, not the executive.

When Congress consents to the Executive making the budget it will have surrendered the most important part of a representative government.

Congress ... is far more than the simple, limited advisory council that most Presidents would like to maintain.

Congress has a lot of powers which people, especially those in the executive branch, don't like to talk about.

The federal courts do not sit as an ombudsman, refereeing the disputes between the other two branches.

The Congress is getting too powerful.