Issue Position: Executive Orders

Issue Position

All presidents beginning with George Washington in 1789 have issued orders that in general terms can be described as executive orders. Executive orders help officers and agencies of the executive branch manage the operations within the federal government itself. Until the early 1900s, executive orders went mostly unannounced and undocumented, seen only by the agencies to which they were directed.

They are strictly confined to directing agencies (e.g. the Army, Navy, Coast Guard, cabinet agencies) that the president has constitutional authority over. They are invalid whenever they are issued in place of congressional legislation. Any president who issues them outside their narrowly defined scope is acting illegally and can be successfully impeached for such an action.

In like manner, when a president refuses to enforce enacted legislation he is violating his oath to "faithfully execute the laws of the land" and should be impeached.

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