Talk:Executive privilege

Incomplete
"Post: No mention of Presidents Reagan or Bush 41, though they invoked executive privilege 3 times and 1 time, respectively.

Graymatta (talk) 16:59, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

Expand on Executive Immunity
This page mentions "Executive Immunity" in the middle of the section on United States v. Nixon, but does not define it, nor link anywhere that does. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Endymon (talk • contribs) 17:48, 15 January 2020 (UTC)

Untitled
Does anyone know where one can find a comprehensive list of all the times the executive privilege has been used? Also what is exceptional about the Bill Clinton assertion of the privilege is this inclusion politically motivated or is there some academic merit that has been left out of the post?


 * I don't think it has been often used. Bill Clinton's inclusion is related to the importance and rarity of its use. -  T&#949;x  &#964;  ur&#949;  19:17, 10 Jun 2004 (UTC)

The only cases of Executive Privilage that I have ever seen concern the enforcement of the law during an investigation, Starr and Juworski for example. The Senate gives itself subpeona power in rule XXIV of the senate rules. Is there any basis in law for that supeona power other than they give it themselves?

Encroachment?
The current text refers to "the power claimed by the President of the United States and other members of the executive branch to resist certain search warrants and other encroachments." "Encroachment", however, implies impropriety. One definition:


 * 1. to advance beyond proper, established, or usual limits; make gradual inroads: A dictatorship of the majority is encroaching on the rights of the individual.
 * 2. to trespass upon the property, domain, or rights of another, esp. stealthily or by gradual advances.

I am changing this to the NPOV "certain search warrants and other interventions by the legislative and judicial branches of government." Harold f

Not the same thing
This article really should point out that the modern notion of Executive Privilege — the idea that presidents' documents are their own confidentially, and that presidents have no obligation at all to provide their documents to anyone for any reason — is very different from anything that Washington or Jefferson ever argued. Washington's and Jefferson's refusals were based on very different, far more limited arguments.

When Washington refused to provide his papers on the Jay Treaty to the House of Representatives, it was done under "Separation of Powers", the idea that no branch of government has any authority outside those specifically given to it by the Constitution. Since the House has no constitutional authority in making treaties, Washington simply replied that it had no authority to ask for his documents. However, when the Senate — which does have authority in treaty making — asked for those very same documents, Washington provided made them available. Although Washington denied the specific authority of the House to ask for documents on treaties, he never denied the authority of the Senate to ask for those same documents, nor did he deny the authority of the House to ask for other documents over which it does have constitutional authority, nor did he deny the obligation of the President to provide documents that were legitimately requested.

Similarly, Jefferson never argued that as president his documents were his own confidentially, and that he had no obligation to surrender his documents. In the Burr case, he argued only that to do so would be unwise because it would compromise national security.

Changes
"In 1796, President George Washington refused to comply with a request by the House of Representatives for documents which were relating to the negotiation of the then-recently adopted Jay Treaty with England."

I have altered that statement to remove England and replace it with Great Britain. England was a component part of Great Britain after 1707.

Kaenei (talk) 15:46, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

Request to revert order
Recently this page has changed from a president by president organization to a "Pre-Nixon" "Post-Nixon" page. This makes little to no sense to me, Nixon is not the be-all-end-all president. Clearly separating the executive privilege records of Bill Clinton and George Bush is, in my opinion, very important. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 12.178.74.70 (talk) 00:52, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Reserve power / subpoena
Removed reserve power since executive privilege is often invoked and is not a reserve power. Also changed search warrant to subpoena. A search warrant authorizes handing over of documents, but doesn't require it. A subpoena is something different.

Roadrunner (talk) 08:34, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Executive privileges invoked on state and local level, too?
I don't think federal government of the United States is the only one with executive branch asserting executive privileges at any time, is it? Isn't it possible that local and state officials also invokes the executive privileges at any times? For example, a district attorney might invokes an executive privilege if subpoenaed by the grand jury in an extraordinary circumstance. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Chief of Staff (talk • contribs) 04:22, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Edit request on 27 June 2012
List the 14 Executive Privilege requests Clinton submitted... only 2 were mentioned !!

71.170.223.134 (talk) 02:15, 27 June 2012 (UTC)


 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: Please provide a verbatim copy, including reliable sources, of the content you'd like to see added. Rivertorch (talk) 06:09, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
 * P.S. When you begin a line with a space, it winds up

looking like this instead of like this. Rivertorch (talk) 06:12, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

External links modified
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 * Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20111123184803/http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071130/ap_on_go_co/senate_prosecutors_17 to http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071130/ap_on_go_co/senate_prosecutors_17
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Error in relationship to deliberative process privilege
Both this article and the one on the deliberative process privilege currently describe the executive privilege as a special case of the deliberative process privilege.

In this article: "Executive privilege is a specific instance of the more general common-law principle of deliberative process privilege and is believed to trace its roots to the English Crown Privilege."

In the article on the deliberative process privilege: "In the context of the US presidential offices and their workproducts, this principle is often referred to as executive privilege."

As far as I'm aware, this is wrong, and in fact the very source that this article cites for this states, to the contrary, that the deliberative process privilege is one form of executive privilege (pp. 1184-5). This is also clear from this exposition at the NYU's Brennan Center for Justice.

I'm not an expert on this and don't feel bold enough to fix it, but someone should. This article should list the types of executive privilege, perhaps drawing on the NYU source above.

Joriki (talk)15:27, March 28, 2017‎ (UTC)
 * User:Joriki, I have attempted to fix this. No guarantees that I did it correctly, but I think I did.&#32;Anythingyouwant (talk) 03:11, 14 June 2017 (UTC)

External links modified
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A contradiction?
It seems as though the introduction of the article suggests that United States v. Nixon affirmed the power of Executive Privilege, but the later body of this article suggests that the effect of United States v. Nixon was to limit that power. 70.23.42.40 (talk) 21:51, 11 May 2019 (UTC)
 * Yeah. The opening paragraph says Regarding requests from Congress … only two federal court cases had addressed the merits of executive privilege… But United States v. Nixon addressed that issue, ruling against the President. There's a clearer description later on in the article, but that isn't mentioned in the opening paragraph, which makes the opening somewhat misleading. —MiguelMunoz (talk) 19:30, 25 June 2019 (UTC)