To What Extent Was Lincoln An Imperial Presidency

Imperial presidency, the concept of the executive branch of the United States having supreme control or total control of the United States government and the other two branches. The executive branch would undermine the authority of the judicial and legislative branch and basically become the heart and soul of the United States government. There are many reasons why this could happen and why it would last. , Rather than having reliance on the cabinet secretaries, excessive reliance could be put instead on White House aides, the civil and political decay of the judicial and legislative branch, congress could isolate the president from members of the congress and the President could make decisions in secrecy, using his executive privileges to

Back in the 19th century, specifically May 25, 1861, when Lincoln was the president of the United States, he had an instance when he was the imperial president. During the civil war, many Southern supporters were disrupting the war efforts of the Northern side. Lincoln saw this as a problem because it was slowing the Northern sides war efforts and it was making the North lose the war. His solution to this was an automatic suspension of the Writ of Habeas Corpus, basically suspending any citizens right to a trial or judicial review and sending them straight to jail. This was a big abuse of power due to the fact that only five years later was this reviewed and it was discovered that only Congress had the power to suspend the writ and the president has no jurisdiction over that. Another instance of imperial presidency took place in the 20th century with president Nixon. On February 22, 1969, the North Vietnamese launched a new offensive against American forces in South Vietnam from their sanctuaries in Cambodia. Instead of ignoring the social situation, Nixon instead went paranoid and took offense to it, launching a plan with his advisor, Henry Kissinger, that would have devastating effects. Nixon abused his power of presidency and launched a nuclear bombing of Cambodia, something that was definitely not under his jurisdiction, but was still a request put to action. These specific examples are just a few where a president in power utilized their war budget powers expansively and did something that would now be considered imperial