9 Presidents Who Screwed Up America Quotes

“Roosevelt had usurped constitutional power from Congress and bullied the American people into giving up their hard assets for pieces of paper. King Midas would have been proud, except everything Roosevelt’s Treasury touched turned to paper.”
― Brion T. McClanahan, 9 Presidents Who Screwed Up America: And Four Who Tried to Save Her

“The Confederate States of America in 1861 was legally an independent government. The Southern states seceded by popular conventions of the people of each state, the same method they had used to ratify the Constitution. The causes underpinning the secession of the Southern states can be debated, but not the principle or legality of secession.”
― Brion T. McClanahan, 9 Presidents Who Screwed Up America: And Four Who Tried to Save Her

“Madison suggested that the president should have “power to carry into effect the national laws, to appoint to offices in cases not otherwise provided for, and to execute such other powers ‘not legislative nor judiciary in their nature’ as may from time to time be delegated by the national legislature.”4 The phrase “not legislative nor judiciary in their nature” is crucial. The president was not to have legislative power, meaning he is not constitutionally the “chief legislator”—as too many Americans today believe.”
― Brion T. McClanahan, 9 Presidents Who Screwed Up America: And Four Who Tried to Save Her

“The four presidents who “tried to save” America took this perilous trail. That should be admired, not condemned. It also should be noted that none of the men who “tried to save her” were pushovers in office. They typically deferred to Congress when the Constitution required they do so, and they let Congress lead the legislative process—that was the proper course constitutionally. But Congress often characterized them as too strong and too willing to wield executive power. That should say something about the charge that they were executive lightweights. These four men exercised power not for political gain but to “defend the Constitution” from radical departures from its original intent. They defended their oath. If Americans believe in a federal Republic with limited powers, defined by a written constitution, with checks and balances—not only between the three branches of the general government but also between the general and state governments—then the four men who “tried to save” constitutional government in our Republic should be regarded as the greatest presidents in American history. They must be our standard. Our future executives should be more like Tyler than either Roosevelt in the use of executive powers and more like Cleveland or Coolidge than Obama in regard to character. The presidency is a potentially dangerous office that, regardless of which party controls it, should always be viewed with suspicion. A return to this type of vigilance would protect both individual liberty and the liberty of the community from executive abuse. As we enter another presidential election season, that should be our goal. A proper understanding of the president’s limited powers under our Constitution should guide the way all Americans vote. THE FOUNDERS’ EXECUTIVE The Founders left clues in the historical record, some of them more conspicuous than others, which defined their vision for the executive branch.”
― Brion T. McClanahan, 9 Presidents Who Screwed Up America: And Four Who Tried to Save Her

“No president, no matter how good his intentions, and no matter how pressing the crisis, is justified in exercising powers that the Constitution simply does not give him.”
― Brion T. McClanahan, 9 Presidents Who Screwed Up America: And Four Who Tried to Save Her

“Potential executive abuse was one of the most feared results of the ratification of the Constitution. The founding generation considered an out-of-control executive to be the greatest bane to liberty”
― Brion T. McClanahan, 9 Presidents Who Screwed Up America: And Four Who Tried to Save Her

“If Cleveland had only used the bully pulpit to harangue congressional leaders and rammed his “agenda” through the halls of Congress, he might have accomplished something, but Cleveland let Congress legislate and his recommendations ended up in the Senate waste receptacle. In reality, Cleveland should be admired for this stance. According to the Constitution, the president has no power to initiate legislation. Cleveland accepted the limitations the Constitution places on the executive because not doing so would have resulted in an unconstitutional usurpation of power from the Congress. He did not always like the outcome, but Congress could choose how to receive his recommendations.”
― Brion T. McClanahan, 9 Presidents Who Screwed Up America: And Four Who Tried to Save Her

“According to the Constitution as ratified, the legislature was to be the most powerful and important branch of government. Jefferson echoed this theme in the opening paragraph of his speech. “To you, then, gentlemen, who are charged with the sovereign functions of legislation, and to those associated with you, I look with encouragement for that guidance and support which may enable us to steer with safety the vessel in which we are all embarked amidst the conflicting elements of a troubled world.” Notice that Jefferson was not setting policy; he was looking for “guidance and support” from the “sovereign” men who served in the legislative branch. He would not be “chief legislator.” Jefferson’s job, as he saw it, was to make recommendations and then execute the laws of Congress, nothing more. And in a subtle though important change, Jefferson’s “recommendations” would arrive as a written message to Congress rather than in person—the executive was not to encroach on legislative matters. Every successive president continued Jefferson’s practice until Woodrow Wilson took office in 1913.”
― Brion T. McClanahan, 9 Presidents Who Screwed Up America: And Four Who Tried to Save Her

“His first term is a model in executive restraint; it turned around an American political system that had deviated widely from the promises that the proponents of the Constitution had made when it was ratified in 1788. Jefferson was not perfect—his second term was a disaster constitutionally—but he set the stage for twenty-four years of executive authority that generally coincided with the way the friends of the Constitution had sold the office to a reluctant population during the state ratifying conventions.”
― Brion T. McClanahan, 9 Presidents Who Screwed Up America: And Four Who Tried to Save Her

“Violating the presidential oath, in whatever fashion, constitutes a “high crime and misdemeanor”—according to the founding generation’s definition.”
― Brion T. McClanahan, 9 Presidents Who Screwed Up America: And Four Who Tried to Save Her

“Thus the Truman Doctrine—the president’s commitment of the United States to oppose Soviet expansionism, starting with Turkey and Greece—was born. The die had been cast. Truman had firmly planted his flag in Wilsonian internationalism.”
― Brion T. McClanahan, 9 Presidents Who Screwed Up America: And Four Who Tried to Save Her

“By 1937, Roosevelt realized that the New Deal was on life support. Many of the programs did not work as intended, and the economy had taken a dip. But Roosevelt could not go before the American public and announce that billions of dollars worth of federal programs had produced only a sluggish economy or, even worse, another depression. So he simply changed the language. The economy, he said, was simply in a “recession.” It would bounce back. (This was ingenious. Since 1937, no American politician has used the word “depression” to describe poor economic performance. A “recession” sounds softer, more palatable, and certainly more optimistic.)”
― Brion T. McClanahan, 9 Presidents Who Screwed Up America: And Four Who Tried to Save Her

“Roosevelt did an about-face and adopted Hoover’s blueprint for government involvement in the economy—then juiced it on steroids.”
― Brion T. McClanahan, 9 Presidents Who Screwed Up America: And Four Who Tried to Save Her

“Southerner Tom Watson, a populist Jeffersonian from Georgia, faced potential prosecution under the law because his newspaper often opposed Wilson’s war aims and policies. Several movie directors were arrested or fined, one because his film on the American War for Independence cast the British in a negative light.”
― Brion T. McClanahan, 9 Presidents Who Screwed Up America: And Four Who Tried to Save Her

“Wilson also made regulating information and speech a top priority. Less than two weeks after his request for a declaration of war, Wilson nationalized the “wireless” industry (radios) in order to control information. He established a Committee of Public Information charged with advancing the correct interpretation of the War for schools, the press, and the public at large and promoting his war aims at home and abroad. A December 1917 executive order established a division to create and distribute motion pictures to troops in Europe for their entertainment and education. Wilson’s propaganda knew no bounds.”
― Brion T. McClanahan, 9 Presidents Who Screwed Up America: And Four Who Tried to Save Her

“Alexander Hamilton’s proposal for a First Bank of the United States met resistance from Thomas Jefferson and James Madison because the power to charter a bank or any other corporation was not a delegated power of the general government. When Hamilton suggested that Jefferson read between the lines, Jefferson responded that he could find only blank space.”
― Brion T. McClanahan, 9 Presidents Who Screwed Up America: And Four Who Tried to Save Her

“Wilson’s defining achievement as president was his legislative agenda, the “New Freedom.” He had written in 1908 that the president was “the political leader of the nation.” Wilson took it upon himself to be a new type of executive, a prime minister more than a president, to guide the legislative process so that “no other single force can withstand him, no combination of forces will easily overpower him.”4 The New Freedom represented his plan for a new America, with the government, the Constitution, and the relationship between the central authority and the people all remade—to give the president new, sweeping powers. Teddy Roosevelt had started this process in 1901. Wilson put an exclamation point on the effort. And the presidents who followed him built on Wilson’s theoretical designs and program directives.”
― Brion T. McClanahan, 9 Presidents Who Screwed Up America: And Four Who Tried to Save Her

“Over a two-year period, the Obama administration delayed the implementation of the Affordable Care Act twenty-eight times, ostensibly to give employers time to comply with the law.9 This was a blatantly unconstitutional power grab by the executive office. Congress alone has the power to legislate, and once a law is passed and signed by the president, the executive branch has a constitutional responsibility to enforce that law. Obama had no legal authority to issue such delays, particularly in regard to employer and individual mandates. These mandates would have been (and are) painful and probably would have resulted in even larger losses for the Democrats in the 2014 election cycle.”
― Brion T. McClanahan, 9 Presidents Who Screwed Up America: And Four Who Tried to Save Her

“The Supreme Court upheld the law in the 2012 decision of National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius, but not because it believed the Congress had the power to force people to buy insurance under the Commerce Clause or the Necessary and Proper Clause. Congress, the 5–4 majority decided, had the power to mandate that people buy health insurance because the fine for failing to do so could be regarded as a tax. This particular argument was buried in the legal defense of the law and was only teased out in the final day of arguments by the Court itself. This proves that the Court cannot be trusted to block unconstitutional legislation.”
― Brion T. McClanahan, 9 Presidents Who Screwed Up America: And Four Who Tried to Save Her

“But George Mason still had concerns; he reasoned that though Congress would have had to call up the militia and the army, the president would have no restrictions on his power once in command of the armed forces.5 This fear has been justified in the modern era.”
― Brion T. McClanahan, 9 Presidents Who Screwed Up America: And Four Who Tried to Save Her

“Taken as a whole, the last four administrations represent the culmination of a century of executive abuse. With each successive president from forty-one to forty-four the disease grew worse. By the time Obama leaves office in 2017, Americans will have suffered under twenty-eight consecutive years of unconstitutional executive usurpation of power. An elected king? The British taxpayer spends around $50 million annually to support the entire royal family. With an annual budget that exceeds $1 billion for expenses, including travel, the American president supplanted the British monarch in everything but a title long ago.”
― Brion McClanahan, 9 Presidents Who Screwed Up America: And Four Who Tried to Save Her

“A written constitution established constraints because history had proven that the executive—whether a king, a dictator, a tsar, a tyrant, a pharaoh, or an emperor—was the greatest threat to liberty. Thus, in order to “secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity,”
― Brion T. McClanahan, 9 Presidents Who Screwed Up America: And Four Who Tried to Save Her