Consider the operation and importance of the presidential veto.
One of the powers granted to the president in the US constitution is the power of the veto: meaning I forbid in Latin. The presidential veto is an excellent example of checks and balances; as Congress seeks to dilute presidential initiatives, so does the president to congressional legislation, it is a reciprocal relationship.
There have been three types of veto to date: The regular veto, the pocket veto and the line-item veto.
The regular veto is where the presidents refuses to sign a Bill that has been passed by Congress, thus preventing it from becoming an Act of Federal law. Fraklin D. Roosevelt used 372 regular vetoes, demonstrating the extent of which it has been used and maybe used in the future. Obama, the incumbent President has only used two vetoes so far. One must note the regular veto can be overridden by Congress via 2/3 majority vote of both houses, however this process is extremely difficult due to bipartisanship that is require for success. Out of 1497 vetoes, only 110 have been overridden, showing the difficultly of the Congressional Override.
The pocket book veto is exercised by presidents’ to block legislation when Congress goes into recess. In this process, if a Bill passed by Congress comes to Oval office for the president to sign 10 days prior till Congress is adjourned; the president can choose to do nothing and the Bill will die. Harry Truman used 70 pocket book vetoes during his presidency.
The line-item veto is a partial veto which grants the executive authority the powerto nullify or cancel specific provisions of a bill, usually a budget appropriations bill, without vetoing the entire legislative package. The President was briefly granted this power by the Line Item Veto Act of 1996, passed by the Congress to control "pork barrel spending" that favors a particular region rather than the nation as a whole. The line-item veto was used 82 times in 11 Bills from the...