Download or read book Congressional Access to Executive Branch Information written by and published by . This book was released on 2001 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Presidents and scholars identify a variety of constitutional principles and practices to justify the withholding of documents and papers from Congress. No doubt reasonable grounds may be presented for withholding these materials and for preventing some executive officials from testifying before congressional committees. However, these executive arguments are subject to legal and political limits. Executive claims can be offset by equally persuasive arguments that Congress needs access to information to fulfill its constitutional duties. In many cases, legal and constitutional principles are overridden by the politics of the moment and practical considerations. Efforts to discover enduring and enforceable norms in this area invariably fall short. This report begins by reviewing the precedents established during the Washington Administration for withholding documents from Congress. Close examination reveals that the scope of presidential privilege is often exaggerated. Congress had access to more documentation than is commonly believed and might have had more had it pressed for it. Subsequent sections focus on various forms of congressional leverage: the power of the purse, the power to impeach, issuing congressional subpoenas, holding executive officials in contempt, House resolutions of inquiry, GAO investigations, and blocking nominations, all of which may force executive officials to release documents they would otherwise want to keep private and confidential. Even if Presidents announce perfectly plausible grounds for withholding documents, they may have to comply with the congressional will to achieve other more important goals. For a comprehensive CRS study of different techniques and authorities used by Congress to oversee executive branch activities, see "Congressional Oversight Manual," CRS Report RL30240 (June 25, 1999). Legal and historical analysis on these issues is covered by Morton Rosenberg, "Presidential Claims of Executive Privilege: History, Law, Practice and Recent Developments," CRS Report RS30319 (September 21, 1999).
Download or read book Congressional Access to Executive Branch Information written by and published by . This book was released on 2001 with total page 55 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Congressional Access to Executive Branch Information written by Louis Fisher and published by . This book was released on 2001 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This report begins by reviewing the precedents established during the Washington Administration for withholding documents from Congress. Close examination reveals that the scope of presidential privilege is often exaggerated. Congress had access to more documentation than is commonly believed and might have had more had it pressed for it. Subsequent sections focus on various forms of congressional leverage: the power of the purse, the power to impeach, issuing congressional subpoenas, holding executive officials in contempt, House resolutions of inquiry, GAO investigations, and blocking nominations, all of which may force executive officials to release documents they would otherwise want to keep private and confidential. Even if Presidents announce perfectly plausible grounds for withholding documents, they may have to comply with the congressional will to achieve other more important goals.
Download or read book Congressional Access to and Control and Release of Sensitive Government Information written by United States. Congress. Senate. Committee on the Judiciary. Subcommittee on Separation of Powers and published by . This book was released on 1977 with total page 128 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Politics of Executive Privilege written by Louis Fisher and published by . This book was released on 2004 with total page 296 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For over 200 years, Congress and the President have locked horns on an issue that will not, and cannot go away: legislative access to executive branch information. Presidents and their advisers often claim that the sought-for information is covered by the doctrine of executive privilege and other principles that protect confidentiality among presidential advisers. For its part, Congress will articulate persuasive reasons why legislative access is crucial. In terms of constitutional principles, these battles are largely a standoff, and court decisions in this area are interesting but hardly dispositive. What usually breaks the deadlock is a political decision: the determination of lawmakers to use the coercive tools available to them, and political calculations by the executive branch whether a continued standoff risks heavy and intolerable losses for the President. Many useful and thoughtful standards have been developed to provide guidance for executive-legislative disputes over access to information. Those standards, constructive as they are, are set aside at times to achieve what both branches may decide has higher importance; settling differences and moving on. Legal and constitutional principles, finely-honed as they might be, are often overridden by the politics of the moment and practical considerations. Efforts to discover enduring and enforceable norms in this area invariably fall short. Efforts to resolve interbranch disputes on purely legal grounds may have to give ground in the face of superior political muscle by a Congress determined to exercise the many coercive tools available to it. By the same token, a Congress that is internally divided or uncertain about its institutional powers, or unwilling to grind it out until the documents are delivered, will lose out in a quest for information. Moreover, both branches are at the mercy of political developments that can come around the corner without warning and tilt the advantage decisively to one side. It is tempting to see the executive-legislative clashes only as a confrontation between two branches, yielding a winner and a loser. It is more than that. Congressional access represents part of the framers' belief in representative government. When lawmakers are unable (or unwilling) to obtain executive branch information needed for congressional deliberations, the loss extends to the public, democracy, and constitutional government. The system of checks and balances and separation of powers are essential to protect individual rights and liberties. This book is also available in paper binding. "[T]ightly reasoned, nuanced, and thoroughly researched." -- Athan Theoharis, Marquette University Political Science Quarterly
Download or read book US Government Information Policies and Practices written by United States. Congress. House. Government Operations and published by . This book was released on 1972 with total page 384 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Congressional Record written by United States. Congress and published by . This book was released on 1971 with total page 1380 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Congressional Record is the official record of the proceedings and debates of the United States Congress. It is published daily when Congress is in session. The Congressional Record began publication in 1873. Debates for sessions prior to 1873 are recorded in The Debates and Proceedings in the Congress of the United States (1789-1824), the Register of Debates in Congress (1824-1837), and the Congressional Globe (1833-1873)
Download or read book Congressional Access to Information in an Impeachment Investigation written by Todd Garvey and published by . This book was released on 2019-11-04 with total page 42 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Committee investigations in the House of Representatives can serve several objectives. Most often, an investigation seeks to gather information either to review past legislation or develop future legislation, or to enable a committee to conduct oversight of another branch of government. These inquiries may be called legislative investigations because their legal authority derives implicitly from the House's general legislative power. Much more rarely, a House committee may carry out an investigation to determine whether there are grounds to impeach a federal official-a form of inquiry known as an impeachment investigation. While the labels "legislative investigation" and "impeachment investigation" provide some context to the objective or purpose of a House inquiry, an investigation may not always fall neatly into one of these categories. This ambiguity has been a topic of interest to many during the various ongoing House committee investigations concerning President Trump. On September 24, 2019, Speaker Pelosi announced that these investigations constitute an "official impeachment inquiry." Although these committee investigations into allegations of presidential misconduct are proceeding, in the Speaker's words, under the "umbrella of [an] impeachment inquiry," most appear to blend lawmaking, oversight, and impeachment purposes. However an investigation is labeled, because the Constitution provides the House with the "sole Power of Impeachment," implementation of the impeachment power, including any ancillary investigative powers, would appear textually committed to the discretion of the House. Yet the House has not established a single, uniform approach to starting impeachment investigations. The process has instead evolved, generally tracking changes the House has made to its committee structure and the investigative authorities conferred to its committees. Although impeachment investigations have often been authorized by a House resolution, they have also been conducted without an explicit authorization. There are still other examples where the House provided express authorization only after a committee had engaged in a "preliminary" impeachment investigation. An impeachment investigation may be more likely-relative to a traditional legislative investigation-to obtain certain categories of information, especially from the executive branch. For example, it is possible that the significance of an exercise of the impeachment power, in conjunction with a resulting increase in political and public pressure, may itself affect the Executive's compliance decisions. But an impeachment investigation may also have legal impacts. If, in the face of a dispute with the executive branch over access to information, the House chose to seek judicial enforcement of an investigative demand, there appear to be at least three potential ways in which the impeachment power could, relative to a legislative investigation, provide the House with a stronger legal position. An impeachment investigation may (1) improve the likelihood of a court authorizing committee access to grand jury materials; (2) relieve any possible limitations imposed by the requirement that a committee act with a "legislative purpose"; and (3) improve the likelihood that a committee will be able to overcome privilege assertions such as executive privilege. In the past, executive noncompliance with an impeachment investigation has also prompted the investigating committee to recommend to the House an article of impeachment for contempt of Congress. That said, a congressional committee engaged in a legislative investigation could arguably obtain much of the same information as it would during an impeachment inquiry, as both legislative and impeachment investigations constitute an exercise of significant constitutional authority.
Download or read book Congressional Access to Classified National Security Information written by Kate Martin and published by . This book was released on 2007 with total page 4 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Congress must have access to information about executive branch activities if it is to carry out its constitutional responsibilities to make laws, appropriate funds, conduct oversight, and confirm agency officials. While few would question the need to safeguard national security information from improper public disclosures that would damage the national interest, the executive branch has repeatedly claimed the authority to withhold such information from Congress as well.
Download or read book Checks in the Balance written by Alexander Bolton and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2021-12-14 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How access to resources and policymaking powers determines the balance of power between the legislative and executive branches The specter of unbridled executive power looms large in the American political imagination. Are checks and balances enough to constrain ambitious executives? Checks in the Balance presents a new theory of separation of powers that brings legislative capacity to the fore, explaining why Congress and state legislatures must possess both the opportunities and the means to constrain presidents and governors—and why, without these tools, executive power will prevail. Alexander Bolton and Sharece Thrower reveal how legislative capacity—which they conceive of as the combination of a legislature’s resources and policymaking powers—is the key to preventing the accumulation of power in the hands of an encroaching executive. They show how low-capacity legislatures face difficulties checking the executive through mechanisms such as discretion and oversight, and how presidents and governors unilaterally bypass such legislative adversaries to impose their will. When legislative capacity is high, however, the legislative branch can effectively stifle executives. Bolton and Thrower draw on a wealth of historical evidence on congressional capacity, oversight, discretion, and presidential unilateralism. They also examine thousands of gubernatorial executive orders, demonstrating how varying capacity in the states affects governors’ power. Checks in the Balance affirms the centrality of legislatures in tempering executive power—and sheds vital new light on how and why they fail.
Download or read book Congressional Research Support and Information Services written by United States. Congress. Joint Committee on Congressional Operations and published by . This book was released on 1974 with total page 496 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book U S Government Information Policies and Practices the Pentagon Papers Problems of Congress in obtaining information from the Executive Branch written by United States. Congress. House. Committee on Government Operations. Foreign Operations and Government Information Subcommittee and published by . This book was released on 1972 with total page 384 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Title 44 U S Code proposals for Revision written by United States. Congress. Senate. Committee on Rules and Administration and published by . This book was released on 1997 with total page 442 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Executive Privilege Secrecy in Government Freedom of Information written by United States. Congress. Senate. Committee on Government Operations. Subcommittee on Intergovernmental Relations and published by . This book was released on 1973 with total page 344 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Congressional Access to Information and Executive Privilege written by Richard Ehlke and published by . This book was released on 1976 with total page 34 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book H R 1255 the Presidential Records Act of 1978 written by United States. Congress. House. Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. Subcommittee on Information Policy, Census, and National Archives and published by . This book was released on 2007 with total page 112 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Index of Reports written by and published by . This book was released on 1993 with total page 40 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
