President Donald Trump has signed more executive orders in his first 10 days than his recent predecessors have signed during their first 100. Trump, who fancies himself a man of action, is relishing his power as chief executive.
Trump’s policy decisions, however, have faced resistance from the federal courts. Lawsuits have been filed against the White House for what the plaintiffs categorize as unconstitutional actions that vastly exceed the president’s authority. Nearly 10 federal court judges have placed injunctions on Trump policies. Having lost one of those cases, the Trump administration has already appealed to the circuit courts. While the specifics of each individual case are different, the question is practically identical: Is Trump overstepping his power to pause or cancel federal spending that Congress authorized and appropriated?
Opinions depend on where you sit. Executive branch officials argue that as chief executive of the federal government, the president has the right to dictate how U.S. taxpayer dollars are spent. Lawmakers generally don’t buy that argument because it usurps the so-called power of the purse, or the ability of the legislative branch to authorize and appropriate money for government programs, departments and agencies. Congress tends to guard its spending power as if it were a newborn in the crib, and you can bet that as the cases pertaining to spending work their way through the court system—likely up to the U.S. Supreme Court—the fight between the executive and legislative branches is bound to get ugly.
Yet there’s a heavy dose of irony here. The talk of the town today is about preserving one of Congress’ most fundamental powers: doling out taxpayer money for the executive branch to spend. But there’s another fundamental power that Congress as an institution has largely deferred to the executive without so much as a protest: the power to declare war. We hear a ton about the former but barely a peep about the latter.
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