President as a Populist Office
Clip: 11/24/2025 | 53sVideo has Closed Captions
Jeffrey Rosen explains how presidential power has expanded far beyond the Founders' vision.
Jeffrey Rosen discusses how the modern presidency has grown far beyond what the Founders envisioned. From the rise of executive orders to a passive Congress and a deferential Supreme Court, the balance of power has shifted dramatically—reshaping the role of the president into a populist figure the Constitution never intended.
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Major funding is provided by The Pew Charitable Trusts. Funding is also provided by The Travelers Companies, Inc. , the Charles F. Kettering Foundation, and viewers like you.
President as a Populist Office
Clip: 11/24/2025 | 53sVideo has Closed Captions
Jeffrey Rosen discusses how the modern presidency has grown far beyond what the Founders envisioned. From the rise of executive orders to a passive Congress and a deferential Supreme Court, the balance of power has shifted dramatically—reshaping the role of the president into a populist figure the Constitution never intended.
Problems playing video? | Closed Captioning Feedback
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question that the president has become a populist office in the way that the founders never imagined.
That, combined with the growth of executive orders, George Washington issued less than ten.
Lincoln had more like 50.
But then it ballooned u to hundreds during the New Deal era.
Under Roosevelt ever since President Obama.
So the numbers have been consistent.
But the real change is a supine Congress, a Congress that's refused to check the empowered president, combined with a Supreme Court that's taking an increasingly deferential view of what's called the unitary executive theory, means that just descriptively, whether you think it's a good idea or not, the president has absolutely swelled in ways that the founders did not imagine.
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Major funding is provided by The Pew Charitable Trusts. Funding is also provided by The Travelers Companies, Inc. , the Charles F. Kettering Foundation, and viewers like you.