Henry Adams Quotes

We have not found a way to give Congress control without depriving the President of essential power.

Congressional power has not so much been usurped by the Presidency as given up to the Presidency by Congress.

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

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

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

The powers that are surrendered [by Congress] to one President remain to be used by others.

I do not believe that we [Congress] should allow him [the President] to nullify acts of Congress by executive fiat. There is not one syllable in the Constitution which authorizes the President to exercise such power.

[Congress is] the chief aggrandizer of the Executive.

The President ... should be merely the executor of a power of decision that rests elsewhere; that is, in the Congress.

Legislative power is always superior to the executive.

... the opinion of the Supreme Court ... ought not to control the co-ordinate authorities of this Government. The Congress, the Executive, and the Court, must each be guided by its own opinion of the constitution.

The Founders of this Nation entrusted the lawmaking power to the Congress alone in both good and bad times … the President's power to see that the laws are faithfully executed refutes the idea that he is to be a law-maker.

It is up to Congress to see to it that its powers do not slip through its fingers

Every American war has brought a struggle between Congress and the Executive over war powers. The Constitution is somewhat annoyingly ambiguous on the point declaring that the President is Commander in Chief but empowering Congress to provide for the common defense, declare war, and raise and support armies.

The Congress may no more regulate the president's ability to detain and interrogate enemy combatants than it may regulate his ability to direct troop movements on the battlefield

Separation of powers means that the president cannot control Congress.

The imperial Presidency requires a passive Congress.

In France, executive power dominates much more than in Anglo-Saxon countries

The authority of Congress must be respected …. The President must confine himself to his executive duties—to obey and execute, not make the laws.

As the Executive cannot decide the question of war on the affirmative side, neither ought it do so on the negative side by preventing the competent body [Congress] from deliberating on the question.

If the president can make whatever policy he likes, we are governed not by law, but by the arbitrary whims of one man ...

The power to make war is vested in Congress and not in the President. Congress has no constitutional authority to grant such authority to the president.

It may be said, indeed, that the Constitution has given to the Executive the power to annul the acts of the legislative body by refusing to them his assent.

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

The president today is the seat of all power.