Robert David Johnson
Executive agents dominated the international environment into which the newly independent United States entered. Absolute monarchs ruled in Prussia, Russia, and Austria, vested with nearly absolute control of their nation's conduct in world affairs. In France, the Estates-General had no effective voice in foreign policy. And even England, despite the growth in parliamentary power following the Glorious Revolution, maintained the fiction of executive unilateralism on national security matters.
By producing a government that vested substantial foreign policy powers in an elected legislature, the American Revolution truly was revolutionary. But the complicated structure established by the Constitution provided few clear boundaries separating Congress from the president, resulting in an almost constant struggle between the two branches. Apart from this internal contest for power, a few patterns have remained constant over most of American history. First, periods of divided government (in which party or ideological gulfs separated the two branches)—the 1850s, the late 1910s, the late 1960s and 1970s—have produced the most spectacular clashes between Congress and the president. But the more substantial shifts in power, usually to the disadvantage of Congress, have come when one party, normally operating with effective presidential leadership, has firmly controlled both branches of government. Such was the case under Thomas Jefferson at the beginning of the 1800s, William McKinley at the end of the century, Franklin D. Roosevelt during World War II, and Lyndon B. Johnson during the mid-1960s. Second, because Congress has tended to feature more dissenting voices, of both the left and the right, when the legislature has exerted its influence it frequently has pushed U.S. foreign policy toward ideological extremes. Finally, the concept of congressional power has been an inherently flexible one. While the abilities to declare war and to approve treaties are the most obvious grants of foreign policy authority the legislature received, Congress has more consistently made its presence felt on international questions through other tools, especially the appropriations power.
See also AMBASSADORS, EXECUTIVE AGENTS, AND SPECIAL REPRESENTATIVES; BIPARTISANSHIP; THE CONSTITUTION; ELITISM; FOREIGN AID; PRESIDENTIAL POWER; PUBLIC OPINION; TREATIES.