Proposals to reform the presidency fall into three increasingly exclusive categories. The most inclusive are those that focus on reforming the American political system and by doing so altering the balance of power within the government, usually in favor of the chief executive. The effort to strengthen the party system is probably the most prominent representative of this orientation. Other proposals, such as a presidential item veto, would increase the president's power on a more modest scale but still require change in the fundamental rules of the game.

A second class of proposals has the narrower aim of reforming the presidency as an institution. Rather than emphasizing increased power for the president, these recommendations attempt to aid the chief executive in carrying out his responsibilities more judiciously. They often focus on providing the president more or better decision-making resources. Plans for reorganizing or otherwise improving the White House staff system or the Executive Office of the President or for insulating the president from parochial demands through a single six-year term are notable examples of suggestions for institutional reform.

The variety of reformist proposals that is most common and most restricted in scope concentrates on improving the presidency by changing the characteristics of the individuals who occupy the Oval Office. Some would have us pay more attention to the character or personality of candidates for the office, while others stress the importance of choosing presidents who possess the proper skills for governing. To achieve these goals, proponents of change advocate reforms ranging from alterations in the processes by which we select presidents to candidate psychoanalysis.

Recent events have rendered the politics and governance of the American presidency a source of scorn and derision. While the nation seeks to come to terms with problems of the most serious magnitude in domestic and foreign affairs, the incumbent of the nation's highest office is crippled by a byzantine arms scandal. Moreover, the candidacy of the opposition's “front-runner” for the 1988 presidential nomination has been derailed by a scandal sufficiently salacious to displace as the focus of the media's attention the first week of congressional hearings that are investigating the Iran-Contra affair.

These developments represent an extraordinarily sharp shift in perceptions about the state of the presidency and American politics. Until the Iran-Contra revelations, many statesmen and scholars credited the Reagan Administration with suspending the paralysis that seemed to grip the nation during the post-Watergate years. For example, a survey of political scientists carried out by the National Journal in 1985 revealed that even many scholars who opposed Reagan's policies granted that the president had shown impressive leadership ability in dominating the government's agenda and mastering the Congress (National Journal, April 6, 1985, 743–747). Yet the Iran-Contra affair has apparently spoiled the Reagan legacy, belying the prospects for an enduring restoration of the presidency and a renewed sense of national purpose. The rapid demise of Senator Hart's candidacy reaffirmed that presidential politics was once again mired in issues of personality and institutional disarray. Indeed, the extreme scrutiny of Hart's “private” activities highlighted the ongoing lack of commitment in American politics to a public philosophy, as well as the absence of institutional strength necessary to cultivate and sustain a coherent sense of national purpose (Brinkley, 1987).

We know that the abuse of power may cause an erosion of authority, but I would suggest that the current “crisis” over Iran and the Contras confirms a notably different lesson: It is the erosion of authority, or the denial to the president of his rightful, constitutional powers, which has produced a stream of factitious crises. The “scandals” are generated by the prospect of an uncontained president, who is seeking to evade the restraints of the law, in order to deploy the instruments of violence in foreign policy. But the president appears to be bent on a course of lawlessness, he seems persistently to be threatening a “constitutional crisis,” only if one accepts the premise that these statutory restraints on the president are eminently reasonable and constitutional. If they are not, then there is no pattern of lawlessness on the part of the president, no scandal, no crisis.

One commentator has recently remarked that the War Powers Act and the Boland amendment have been parts of a design to “criminalize” differences in policy between Congress and the president. A president who took seriously his responsibilities under the Constitution, or a president who sought to exercise the powers that his predecessors have routinely exercised, would be compelled to steer around these restrictions. When he does, he will be charged with putting himself “above the law.” The opposition party, and its allies in the media, will express their outrage and declare the presence of another “scandal.” There will be calls for a special prosecutor, for a select congressional committee to hold extended hearings—in short, the whole script and the stage directions for Watergate, called into play once again. We now have a part of the political class, in government and the media, who have made “deploring” into a vocation: Their main competence has been cultivated in the art of investigating and holding long, debilitating hearings, with the object of bringing down the Administration or rendering the government of the day ineffectual.

Riddle: Why is political reform like a clear mountain lake? Answer: When we look into both we see ourselves.

The Means and Ends of Reforms

What should be the ends of presidential reform? Obviously, such a question assumes that something is wrong and can be remedied through reform, which I define here as an intentional act (or acts) of institutional engineering to restructure incentives in the political system. Naturally, any effort to engage in reform, therefore, raises numerous issues. What are the purposes of reform? What are the problems a reform proposal or package of proposals presumes to address and to remedy? What are the feasibilities for implementation? What are the consequences and implications of reform? Will its purported benefits be larger than the costs incurred? To what extent does thinking about reform help lead to or clarify a theory of the presidency and, more generally, a theory of government? To what extent, above all, when thinking about reform can we escape the time warp in which our present preferences or momentary dissatisfactions lie? A would-be reformer must struggle to disassociate short-term preferences and judgments about an incumbent from longer-term conceptions as to how institutions should operate. In this regard, a would-be reformer must think like a constitution-maker. Is this the system one would prefer under worst case conditions?