Presidential Executive Orders Quotes
The executive order to which this statement referred was the then new President’s first—Executive Order 13489. It was enthusiastically received by the public, historians, researchers and the media. However at the end of Obama’s two administrations, the system was a little better than when George W. Bush, blocked much of the Freedom of Information Act from being implemented. However, the agencies who want to operate in secrecy without having to deal with public criticism, had developed even more sophisticated techniques of avoiding transparency and when they must disclose, they have developed techniques to delay the process, sometimes even for years, while they study whether the material should be disclosed. The president personally declassified a few CIA files from decades ago that the agency maintained should be secret, but he did nothing else systemic so solve the problem of declassifying and material and nothing to control the over classification which virtually everyone agrees is a major problem. More material is being classified than ever.
This was one of the best confirmations that Nixon had authorized illegal activity to further his reelection prospects and then orchestrated a cover up of the crimes.
In 2006, in the midst of the War on Terror, it was revealed that President George W. Bush had approved a electronic surveillance program that was on the surface contrary to the FISA laws prohibiting such government activity. The President claimed that the necessities of the war required such a deviation. A national debate ensued as to whether the President was always required to follow laws as passed or did he have “inherent powers” under the Constitution to do whatever he thought necessary to fight a war.
The president had the 113th Congress—the most unproductive congress in American history. The Democrats controlled the House and the Republicans controlled the House of Representatives. But the Republicans were badly split between the regular Republicans and the Tea Party republicans who did not want to pass any legislation that would cost money or would make the President look good. The Republican Speaker of the House was not very strong and could not control or even coordinate his own party. So Obama did what Abraham Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt had done with difficult Congresses, and found as much as he could do by issuing executive orders which did not need Congressional approval. Some of the Republicans were outraged that he was doing what the great Republican Presidents had done earlier and end-running Congress.
President Lincoln and Several of the Commanding Union Generals had declared that black slaves were free during the midst of the Civil War under the legal theory that if the slaves were property of the rebels, then they cold be seized as “contraband” and removed from the control of those who had committed treason. The question was, what would happen to those now free Negroes after the war? Many Negro leaders were anxious that if there were surrender, then the status quo ante might prevail and the Negroes—many have who had fought for the Union might be returned to slavery. This speech by the Secretary of State alarmed them further. This is why the Emancipation Proclamation was so important and even that might have been overturned by a subsequent President. This is why Lincoln, the white radical Republicans and the Black leadership placed so much emphasis on passing the 13th Amendment.
What makes this quotation important is that the Central Intelligence Agency disobeyed the order and implemented a number of covert operations in Indonesia and CIA Director Alan Dulles did not tell the President. See {634612} for his rationale.
