Here's a great read from the Atlantic.
Was the design of the executive branch the founder's greatest mistake? Garret Epps makes a great case that it was and that a Constitutional convention would be required to correct it.
The problems begins with the fact that Washington's intimidating presence (it was assumed he'd have the job) prevented the participants from spending enough time properly considering what the office should look like.
Even when Washington remained silent, his presence shaped the debate. When, on June 1, James Wilson suggested that the executive power be lodged in a single person, no one spoke up in response. The silence went on until Benjamin Franklin finally suggested a debate; the debate itself proceeded awkwardly for a little while, and was then put off for another day.
Many of the conversations about presidential authority were similarly awkward, and tended to be indirect. Later interpreters have found the original debates on the presidency, in the words of former Supreme Court Justice Robert H. Jackson, “almost as enigmatic as the dreams Joseph was called upon to interpret for Pharaoh.”
The resulting vagueness has allowed too many presidents, the bad ones in addition to the good, to expand the powers of the office and run roughshod over the other institutions and over the preferences of the population.
2302 students should expect to go over this essay in class when we cover the presidency.
