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24 J.L. & Pol. 1 (2008)
Executive Privilege and the Bush Administration

handle is hein.journals/jlp24 and id is 7 raw text is: Executive Privilege and the Bush Administration Mark J. Rozell & Mitchel A. Sollenberger* President George W. Bush has engaged in a number of battles over the principle of executive privilege, which recognizes the right of presidents and high-level staff to withhold information from Congress, the courts, and ultimately the public. There is nothing unique about the existence of such disputes, as presidents going back to the earliest years of the republic have asserted the right to conceal various forms of information-usually documents or testimony. To be sure, the phrase executive privilege itself was never officially used by any presidential administration until the 1950s, but the same power effectively has existed since the Washington administration. Some presidents have been strong advocates of this principle; others have been sparse in their exercise of such a power. Presidential use of executive privilege became highly contentious during the Richard Nixon presidency primarily because of the Watergate scandal. Nixon's efforts to use the privilege to conceal evidence of White House criminal activity ultimately fueled a negative perception of that presidential power. The phrase executive privilege seemed forever linked to Watergate and the abuse of presidential power. One consequence of this development was that Nixon's immediate successors were reluctant to claim executive privilege because of its negative connotation. Presidents Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter generally avoided using executive privilege, Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush also made sparing use of this power. It was not until the presidency of Bill Clinton that a post-Watergate administration seemed to show little or no embarrassment about exercising executive privilege. The trouble was, Clinton's best-known use of that power was in a personal scandal that did not provide for the type of circumstance to create a favorable view of executive privilege. Like Nixon's actions in Watergate, Clinton's repeated defeats in the courtroom to conceal information and testimony of White House aides not only damaged the legal standing of executive privilege, but its reputation as well. It is widely acknowledged, though not always popular, that President George W. Bush has adopted a very expansive view of presidential powers. Many attribute Bush's aggressive use of his powers to the tragedy of September 11, 2001 and to the subsequent War on Terror.' Advocates * Mark J. Rozell is Professor of Public Policy at George Mason University and Mitchel A. Sollenberger is Assistant Professor of Political Science at University of Michigan-Dearborn.

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