- governor: Governors, all of whom are popularly elected, serve as the chief executive officers of the fifty-five states, commonwealths, and territories of the United States.
- constitutional qualifications: He shall be at least thirty years of age, a citizen of the United States, and shall have resided in this State at least five years immediately preceding his election.
- Texas Constitution - Article 4:
- bureaucracy / civil service: Bureaucracy (/bjʊəˈrɒkrəsi/) is a body of non-elected governing officials or an administrative policy-making group.[1] Historically, a bureaucracy was a government administration managed by departments staffed with non-elected officials.[2] Today, bureaucracy is the administrative system governing any large institution, whether publicly owned or privately owned.[3] The public administration in many jurisdictions and sub-jurisdictions exemplifies bureaucracy, but so does any centralized hierarchical structure of an institution, e.g. hospitals, academic entities, business firms, professional societies, social clubs, etc.
- local executive (mayor): The mayor is the chief executive and administrative officer of the city in charge of carrying out the policies set by the council and seeing to it that local laws are enforced.
- local executive (county judge): the county judge has a wide range of judicial and administrative duties and is the presiding officer of the commissioners court.
- weak executive / plural executive:
- strong executive / unitary executive:
- emergency powers: Emergency powers broadly refers to the authority given to individuals in the executive to act outside the traditional bounds of their authority in order to react to a danger that normal channels for approval could not address.
- agenda setting: the "ability (of the news media) to influence the importance placed on the topics of the public agenda".[1] The theory suggests that the media has the ability to shape public opinion by determining what issues are given the most attention, and has been widely studied and applied to various forms of media.
- state of the state address: The State of the State Address is a speech customarily given once each year by the governors of each of the states of the United States
- emergency legislation: why do emergency items matter? According to the Texas Constitution, the House and Senate can’t pass legislation during the first 60 days of a regular session – which this year started on Jan. 10. There are only two exceptions: When four-fifths of either chamber votes to suspend that rule, or if the governor declares the matter an emergency.
Now that Abbott has declared his emergency items, lawmakers can immediately start working on bills related to those topics.
- special sessions: After the end of a regular session and before the start of the next regular session, the Governor may call a special session to cover specific topics. Special sessions can last no longer than 30 days and are limited to the topics designated by the Governor (Texas Constitution Article 3, Section 40).
- term lengths / no terms limits: Thirty-seven states have some form of term limit on the office of governor. Thirteen states do not.
- succession:
- checks and balances: The Checks and Balances system provides each branch of government with individual powers to check the other branches and prevent any one branch from becoming too powerful.
- governors' legislative powers: The constitutional and statutory duties of the Governor include:Signing or vetoing bills passed by the Legislature.
Convening special sessions of the Legislature for specific purposes.
Delivering a report on the condition of the state to the Legislature at the beginning of each regular session.
Accounting for all public monies received and paid out by him and recommending a budget for the next two years.
- budget power: Estimating of the amounts of money required to be raised by taxation.
Accounting for all public monies received and paid out by him and recommending a budget for the next two years.
- line-item veto: the power of an executive authority to nullify or cancel specific provisions of a bill, usually a budget appropriations bill, without vetoing the entire legislative package. The line-item vetoes are usually subject to the possibility of legislative override as are traditional vetoes.
- post adjournment veto: “There's been no effective veto override power for decades largely because of the structure of the system,” said James Henson, director of the Texas Politics Project. "And I think the awareness of governors that all they have to do is wait."
When a bill is vetoed at the end of the session, it’s dead, despite the fact that in the Texas Constitution, there is a veto override clause.
Henson points out that most bills are passed near the end of the session. After lawmakers go home, the governor can go to town with his veto pen. That’s because the only way lawmakers would be able to override it is for the governor himself to call a special session to override his own veto.
- governors' appointive powers: The authority to make governmental appointments is one of the powers given to the Governor of Texas by the state's Constitution.
During a four-year term, the Governor will make about 1,500 appointments.
Most appointments are:State officials and members of state boards, commissions and councils that carry out the laws and direct the policies of state government activities;
Members of task forces that advise the Governor or executive agencies on specific issues and policies; or
State elected and judicial offices when vacancies occur by resignation or death of the office holder.
- patronage: the use of state resources to reward individuals for their electoral support.
- campaign donations: the funds raised to promote candidates, political parties, or policy initiatives and referendums. Political parties, charitable organizations, and political action committees (in the United States) are vehicles used for fundraising for political purposes. "Political finance" is also popular terminology, and is used internationally for its comprehensiveness. Political donations to funds received by political parties from private sources for general administrative purposes.
- agency capture: a form of corruption of authority that occurs when a political entity, policymaker, or regulator is co-opted to serve the commercial, ideological, or political interests of a minor constituency, such as a particular geographic area, industry, profession, or ideological group.
- appointed regulatory commission:
- staggered terms: elections where only some of the places in an elected body are up for election at the same time. For example, United States senators have a six-year term, but they are not all elected at the same time. Rather, elections are held every two years for one-third of Senate seats.
Staggered elections have the effect of limiting control of a representative body by the body being represented
- recess appointments: If an appointment of the Governor is made during the recess of the Senate, the Governor shall nominate the appointee, or some other person to fill the vacancy, to the Senate during the first ten days of its next session following the appointment. - removal power: Impeachment is the power of a legislative body to address charges of impropriety or criminality by a government official, such as a governor or lieutenant governor. In the United States legal tradition, impeachment is comparable to an indictment in a criminal court.
In general, the purpose of an impeachment proceeding is to remove from office a state official accused of wrongdoing. However, “impeachment” in the narrow sense of the word refers only to the first step in a two-part process of removing the official.
- executive order: a directive by the president of the United States that manages operations of the federal government.[1] The legal or constitutional basis for executive orders has multiple sources. Article Two of the United States Constitution gives presidents broad executive and enforcement authority to use their discretion to determine how to enforce the law or to otherwise manage the resources and staff of the executive branch. The ability to make such orders is also based on expressed or implied Acts of Congress that delegate to the president some degree of discretionary power (delegated legislation).[2] The vast majority of executive orders are proposed by federal agencies before being issued by the president.
- senatorial courtesy: a long-standing, unwritten, unofficial, and nonbinding constitutional convention in the U.S. describing the tendency of U.S. senators to support a Senate colleague opposing the appointment to federal office of a nominee from that Senator's state.[1] The practice is motivated by a general sense of collegiality among Senators and the assumption that a Senate colleague will have the best first-hand knowledge of the personal character and qualifications of a nominee from the Senator's own state.
- elected board:
- judicial and county vacancies: can be filled by the governor
- clemency, pardons, parole: The Governor has the authority to grant clemency upon the written recommendation of a majority of the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles (Board). Clemency includes full pardons after conviction or successful completion of a term of deferred adjudication community supervision, conditional pardons, pardons based on innocence, commutations of sentence, and reprieves. In capital cases, clemency includes a commutation of sentence to life in prison and a reprieve of execution. The governor may also grant a one-time reprieve of execution, not to exceed 30 days, without a Board recommendation.
- Board of Pardons and Paroles: a state agency that makes parole and clemency decisions for inmates in Texas prisons.
- ceremonial duties: Examples of a ceremonial role include: throwing out the first pitch at a baseball game; cutting a ribbon at an opening; making a presentation of a certificate, proclamation, award, or other item
- crisis manager: the process by which an organization deals with a disruptive and unexpected event that threatens to harm the organization or its stakeholders.[1] The study of crisis management originated with large-scale industrial and environmental disasters in the 1980s.[2][3] It is considered to be the most important process in public relations.
- military roles: Serving as commander-in-chief of the state's military forces.
- impeachment: the process by which a legislative body or other legally constituted tribunal initiates charges against a public official for misconduct.[1][2] It may be understood as a unique process involving both political and legal elements.
- informal power:
- popular mandate: is the authority granted by a constituency to act as its representative.[1] Elections, especially ones with a large margin of victory, are often said to give the newly elected government or elected official an implicit mandate to put into effect certain policies.[2] When a government seeks re-election they may introduce new policies as part of the campaign, seek voter approval, and say they are seeking a "new mandate". Governments and elected officials may use language of a "mandate" to lend legitimacy to actions that they take while in office.
- veto power: a legal power to unilaterally stop an official action. In the most typical case, a president or monarch vetoes a bill to stop it from becoming law. In many countries, veto powers are established in the country's constitution. Veto powers are also found at other levels of government, such as in state, provincial or local government, and in international bodies.
