I don’t like executive orders in principal because it sets an easily abused exercise of power—one man being able to order an executive branch agency to do whatever he wants. What’s worse is it subverts legislative action in a way that consolidates power into the hands of one man, which is very disconcerting. We don’t live in a monarchy. We aren’t electing dictators. We’re electing presidents who are governed by laws. They’re subject to checks and balances.
On the other hand Lincoln was jolly righteous in freeing the slaves with his Emancipation Proclamation and so was Truman when he desegregated the military. It certainly provides a way to take actions quickly which is what needed to be done in Lincoln’s and Truman’s positions.
I guess I would say it should be conducted only as a last resort in an effort to further the constitutionally accepted civil liberties of Americans. For instance executive orders which infringe on the constitutional rights of others (interment camps/spying) are no no’s where this brotha’ is concerned.
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soft despotism – Alexis de Tocqueville’s term for a society in which most of its members have given up an active role in the ordering of that society only to discover that society and government is run by an ‘immense tutelary power’ which endangers political liberty and discourages participation.
Get yourself a copy of “Democracy in America” by Tocqueville