{"id":567,"date":"2022-11-28T19:10:23","date_gmt":"2022-11-28T19:10:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/hist-211constitution\/?page_id=567"},"modified":"2025-11-17T19:39:42","modified_gmt":"2025-11-17T19:39:42","slug":"presidential-power-cases","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/hist-211constitution\/syllabus\/presidential-power-cases\/","title":{"rendered":"Presidential Power Cases"},"content":{"rendered":"

Walter LaFeber<\/strong><\/h2>\n

\u201cThe turn from Madison\u2019s sensitivity for the delicate balance between power and liberty to NSC 68\u2019s assumption that foreign policy ends justify the means occurred not in the early days of the Cold War but between 1890 and 1920. Supreme Court Justice George S. Sutherland uttered the most famous blessing on that turn in 1936 when he wrote the majority opinion in\u00a0United States v. Curtiss-Wright Export Corporation<\/em>. But Sutherland\u2019s decision had been shaped two decades before, and, resembling most such blessings, it only affirmed behavior that had long been practiced. Imperial presidencies, weak congresses, and cautious courts, which have been endemic to modern United States foreign policy formulation, appeared at the turn of the century. At the same time, the nation\u2019s foreign relations became global rather than continental; they were driven more by corporate than by agrarian interests, and they were tracked by telegraphs and airplanes instead of by couriers and stage coaches. Those changes radically challenged the constitutional forms that had governed the continental foreign policy for a century. Presidents and the courts met the challenge simply and directly: they largely severed foreign policy from traditional constitutional restraints by declaring that international and domestic relations could be dealt with separately. Actions in the world arena were not unduly to affect liberties at home.\u201d\u00a0 \u2013Walter LaFeber, \u201cThe Constitution and United States Foreign Policy,\u201d\u00a0JAH\u00a0<\/em>(1987)<\/a><\/p>\n

Discussion Questions<\/strong><\/p>\n