Executive Orders are Presidential directives to his staff, or government officials and agencies, having the force of law. Initially, they were not distinguished from Presidential Proclamations, Memorandums, and Letters.
Executive Orders were not numbered until 1907, when they were then retroactively assigned back to 1862. There are over 1,500 unnumbered Executive Orders.
In 1936, the Federal Register Act required that Executive Orders be documented and made public.
George Washington issued 8 Executive Orders.
His first was when war between England and France was beginning, and he issued an Executive Order for American citizens to stay neutral.
Since there was not a clear way of enforcing it, when Congress came back in session, it supported Washington by passing the Neutrality Act of 1794.
Lincoln issued 48 Executive Orders, saying “to the extent of my ability I shall take care, as the Constitution itself expressly enjoins upon me, that the laws of the Union be faithfully executed in all the States.” His first Executive Order was at the outset of the Civil War. Democrat John Merryman organized riots in Maryland which attacked Union troops and destroyed telegraph lines. Local Democrat law enforcement refused to arrest him.
Lincoln considered him a public threat and issued an Executive Order to arrest him.
There was a problem, though, as his arrest violated Merryman’s right of habeas corpus, which required law enforcement to first bring the accused before a judge with evidence before locking him in jail.
Before the Supreme Court had a chance to determine if Lincoln had over-stepped his authority, Congress supported Lincoln by passing the Habeas Corpus Act of 1863.
Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, which was an Executive Order to free the slaves. Congress considered this an overreach of his authority.
Lincoln responded by pushing Congress to ratify the 13th Amendment.
Theodore Roosevelt greatly expanded the use of Executive Orders, issuing 1,081 of them.
His attitude was, instead of seeing if the Constitution authorized him, he would issue Executive Orders unless the Constitution specifically prohibited him.
He wrote in his autobiography: “My view was that every executive officer … was a steward of the people bound … to do all he could for the people … anything that the needs of the Nation demanded unless such action was forbidden by the Constitution …
Under this interpretation of executive power I did … many things not previously done by the President … I did not usurp power, but I did greatly broaden the use of executive power.”
What one President does, however, is often outdone by subsequent Presidents.
Thus President Woodrow Wilson issued 1,803 Executive Orders, claiming the emergency of World War I justified it.
During the Great Depression and World War II, Franklin Roosevelt issued a record 3,721 Executive Orders.
By an Executive Order, Roosevelt confiscated all gold held by private citizens.
He closed all banks in the country for four days.
He created agencies, like the Works Progress Administration – WPA, and the Office of Censorship.
He seized private businesses, including mines and factories, such as the North American Aviation plant in California.
Congress supported Roosevelt’s orders by passing the War Labor Disputes Act.
Franklin Roosevelt issued Executive Order 9066 which rounded up 122,000 Japanese-Americans and confined in internment camps in the desert.
The Supreme Court backed up Roosevelt in the 1944 case of Korematsu v. U.S.
Roosevelt used an Executive Order to establish the Manhattan Project which created the atomic bomb.
Truman issued 908 Executive Orders, with a notable one being desegregating the military.
During the Korean War, Truman tried doing what Roosevelt and Wilson did, but this time, Congress and the Courts pushed back.
When union steel workers went on strike in 1951, Truman issued an Executive Order seizing control of all the steel manufacturing plants in the nation.
The Supreme Court limited Truman in the 1952 Youngstown case, saying:
“Presidential powers are not fixed but fluctuate depending upon their disjunction or conjunction with those of Congress … When the President acts pursuant to … authorization of Congress, his authority is at its maximum.”
Eisenhower issued 484 Executive Orders, one of which deployed troops to desegregate Arkansas schools.
John F. Kennedy issued 214 Executive Orders, one of which, EO 10924, created the Peace Corp and another, EO 10973, created USAID.
Lyndon Johnson issued 325 Executive Orders. One was to demand affirmative action be pushed on all federal contractors.
This was eventually struck down by the Supreme Court in 2023.
Another, EO 11130, created the Warren Commission to investigate the Kennedy assassination, which many now suspect was to cover up evidence of his involvement.
Gerald Ford issued 169 Executive Orders, one of which pardoned Richard Nixon.
Jimmy Carter issued 320 Executive Orders, one of which, EO 12127, created FEMA.
Another promoted wage and price controls, including setting the price of oil with Executive Order 12153.
When the Iran crisis took place, Carter issued an Executive Order freezing all Iranian assets in the U.S.
Ronald Reagan issued 381 Executive Orders, many of which peeled back layers of government regulation that hampered economic growth.
Bill Clinton issued 364 Executive Orders, saying: “Stroke of the pen, law of the land. Kind of cool.”
One of his Executive Orders prohibited replacements for striking union workers, which the courts reversed.
George W. Bush issued 291 Executive Orders. One limited the public from seeing presidential documents.
After 911, by Executive Order 13228, Bush created the Department of Homeland Security.
He then instituted government surveillance of American citizens without a warrant, even authorizing the NSA National Security Agency to eavesdrop on citizens’ phone calls.
Obama issued 276 Executive Orders, saying: “We are not just going to be waiting for legislation … I’ve got a pen, and I’ve got a phone.”
Obama issued Executive Order 13707 titled “Using Behavioral Science Insights to Better Serve the American People,” which authorized the Federal government to secretly use media to carry out psychological operations on the American public.
President Donald Trump issued 220 Executive Orders in his first term.
Biden issued 162 Executive orders, many of which revered Trumps Executive Orders.
When Roe v. Wade was overturned, Biden issued Executive Order 14079, to continue ending of the lives of unborn children.
In the first month of Trump’s second term, by Executive Proclamation, he freed J6 prisoners.
He issued 68 Executive Orders, including:
recognizing only two sexes (EO 14168); k
eeping men out of women’s sports (EO 14201);
protecting children from chemical and surgical mutilation (EO 14187);
ending radical indoctrination in K-12 schooling (EO 13985);
ending DEI (EO 14151);
establishing the Department of Government Efficiency (EO 14158);
securing the borders (EO 14165);
withdrawing the U.S. from the World Health Organization (EO 14155);
withdrawing from Paris climate agreement (EO 14162);
designating drug cartels as terrorist organizations (EO 14157);
protecting Second Amendment rights (14206);
freeing up land for oil drilling (14154);
declassifying records of the assassinations of President John F. Kennedy, Senator Robert F. Kennedy, and the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (EO 14176)
renaming national monuments, including renaming the Gulf of America (EO 14172); a
nd eradicating anti-Christian bias (EO 14202), stating:
“The United States Constitution enshrines the fundamental right to religious liberty in the First Amendment …
Yet the previous Administration engaged in an egregious pattern of targeting peaceful Christians … bringing Federal criminal charges and … multi-year prison sentences against nearly two dozen peaceful pro-life Christians for praying … outside abortion facilities.
Those convicted included a Catholic priest and 75-year-old grandmother, as well as an 87-year-old woman and a father of 11 children who were arrested 18 months after praying and singing hymns outside an abortion facility … part of a politically motivated prosecution campaign by the Biden Administration … a Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) memorandum asserted that “radical-traditionalist” Catholics were domestic-terrorism threats …
The Biden Equal Employment Opportunity Commission sought to force Christians to affirm radical transgender ideology against their faith …
The Biden Administration declared March 31, 2024 — Easter Sunday — as “Transgender Day of Visibility” …
Catholic churches and institutions have been aggressively targeted with hundreds of acts of hostility, violence, and vandalism …
My Administration will not tolerate anti-Christian weaponization of government or unlawful conduct targeting Christians.”
Since these Executive Orders can be reversed by any future President, it is up to Congress to pass laws supporting the President’s directives.
This post originally appeared at https://americanminute.com/blogs/todays-american-minute/executive-orders-history-american-minute-with-bill-federer