The study of the presidency—the power of the office, the evolution of the executive as an institution, the men who have served—has generated a great body of research and scholarship.What better way to get students to grapple with the ideas of the literature than through conflicting perspectives on some of the most pivotal issues facing the modern presidency? Richard Ellis and Michael Nelson have once again assembled a cadre of top scholars to offer a series of pro/con essays that will inspire spirited debate beyond the pages of the book. Each essay—written in the form of a debate resolution— offers a compelling yet concise view on the American executive. In essays that are new to this edition, contributors debate the repeal of the 22nd Amendment, the abolition of the vice presidency, the extent to which presidential signing statements threaten the separation of powers, and whether the fighting of the war on terror should require relaxing checks on presidential power. Ellis and Nelson introduce each pair of essays, giving students context and preparing them to read each argument critically, so they can decide for themselves which side of the debate they find most persuasive.

Featuring paired pro/con pieces written specifically for this volume, Debating Terrorism and Counterterrorism : Conflicting Perspectives on Causes, Contexts, and Responses encourages students to grapple with the central debates surrounding the field of terrorism. With topics ranging from the root causes of terrorism, the role of religion in terrorism, whether suicide terrorism is ever justified, whether the spread of democracy can help defeat terrorism, and what trade-offs should exist between security and civil liberties, Gottlieb's outstanding cast of contributors returns, compelling students to wrestle with the conflicting perspectives that define the field. Stuart Gottlieb frames the paired essays with incisive headnotes, providing historical context and preparing students to read each argument critically. Each selection has been updated to account for recent world events, policy changes, and new scholarship. New to the reader, and by reviewer request, is a chapter, "Can Global Institutions Make a Difference in Fighting Terrorism?"

Shines new light on America's brilliant constitutional and presidential history, from George Washington to Barack Obama. In this sweepingly ambitious volume, the nation’s foremost experts on the American presidency and the U.S. Constitution join together to tell the intertwined stories of how each American president has confronted and shaped the Constitution. Each occupant of the office—the first president to the forty-fourth—has contributed to the story of the Constitution through the decisions he made and the actions he took as the nation’s chief executive. By examining presidential history through the lens of constitutional conflicts and challenges, The Presidents and the Constitution offers a fresh perspective on how the Constitution has evolved in the hands of individual presidents. It delves into key moments in American history, from Washington’s early battles with Congress to the advent of the national security presidency under George W. Bush and Barack Obama, to reveal the dramatic historical forces that drove these presidents to action. Historians and legal experts, including Richard Ellis, Gary Hart, Stanley Kutler and Kenneth Starr, bring the Constitution to life, and show how the awesome powers of the American presidency have been shapes by the men who were granted them. The book brings to the fore the overarching constitutional themes that span this country’s history and ties together presidencies in a way never before accomplished.

Shines a light on the constitutional issues that confronted and shaped each presidency from George Washington to the Progressive Era Drawing from the monumental The Presidents and the Constitution: A Living History, published in 2016, the nation’s foremost experts in the American presidency and the US Constitution join together to tell the intertwined stories of how the first twenty-seven distinctive American presidents have confronted and shaped the Constitution and thus defined the most powerful office in human history. From George Washington to William Howard Taft, The Presidents and the Constitution, Volume 1 illuminates the evolving American presidency in a unique way—through the lens of the Constitution itself. Arranged chronologically by president, the book examines the constitutional issues confronting each president in the context of the personalities driving historical events.The contributors illustrate the extensive powers of the American presidency in domestic and foreign affairs, showing how they have been used by the men who were granted them, and brings to light the overarching constitutional themes that span this country’s history and tie each presidency to the other branches of government.

Through a detailed exploration of the viewpoints involved, this balanced and incisive work promotes understanding of the most divisive issues in American government today. Government and politics is an area in which there are no "right" answers, but much room for debate. Battleground: Government and Politics allows students and general readers alike to consider key political debates from all sides and to arrive at their own considered convictions, based on a firm understanding of the issues and points of view involved. This two-volume work explores dozens of the most contentious issues in contemporary life, issues that impact how our government is run today and how it will be run in the future. Each topic is examined in a balanced way, providing not only an overview of the issues involved, but an objective assessment of the stance of all sides. Readers can use these entries as thorough and solid summaries of the most contentious controversies in contemporary society, or as starting points for more in-depth research into the debates.

In The Rhetorical Presidency, Jeffrey Tulis argues that the president’s relationship to the public has changed dramatically since the Constitution was enacted: while previously the president avoided any discussions of public policy so as to avoid demagoguery, the president is now expected to go directly to the public, using all the tools of rhetoric to influence public policy. This has effectively created a "second" Constitution that has been layered over, and in part contradicts, the original one. In our volume, scholars from different subfields of political science extend Tulis’s perspective to the judiciary and Congress; locate the origins of the constitutional change in the Progressive Era; highlight the role of Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, and the mass media in transforming the presidency; discuss the nature of demagoguery and whether, in fact, rhetoric is undesirable; and relate the rhetorical presidency to the public’s ignorance of the workings of a government more complex than the Founders imagined. This book was originally published as a special issue of Critical Review: A Journal of Politics and Society.

"I am nothing, but I may be everything," John Adams, the first vice president, wrote of his office. And for most of American history, the "nothing" part of Adams's formulation accurately captured the importance of the vice presidency, at least as long as the president had a heartbeat. But a job that once was "not worth a bucket of warm spit," according to John Nance Garner, became, in the hands of the most recent vice presidents, critical to the governing of the country on an ongoing basis. It is this dramatic development of the nation's second office that Joel K. Goldstein traces and explains in The White House Vice Presidency. The rise of the vice presidency took a sharp upward trajectory with the vice presidency of Walter Mondale. In Goldstein's work we see how Mondale and Jimmy Carter designed and implemented a new model of the office that allowed the vice president to become a close presidential adviser and representative on missions that mattered. Goldstein takes us through the vice presidents from Mondale to Joe Biden, presenting the arrangements each had with his respective president, showing elements of continuity but also variations in the office, and describing the challenges each faced and the work each did. The book also examines the vice-presidential selection process and campaigns since 1976, and shows how those activities affect and/or are affected by the newly developed White House vice presidency. The book presents a comprehensive account of the vice presidency as the office has developed from Mondale to Biden. But The White House Vice Presidency is more than that; it also shows how a constitutional office can evolve through the repetition of accumulated precedents and demonstrates the critical role of political leadership in institutional development. In doing so, the book offers lessons that go far beyond the nation's second office, important as it now has become.

The monumental battles of World War II's Eastern Front--Moscow, Stalingrad, Kursk--are etched into the historical record. But there is another, hidden history of that war that has too often been ignored in official accounts. Boris Gorbachevsky was a junior officer in the 31st Army who first saw front-line duty as a rifleman in the 30th Army. Through the Maelstrom recounts his three harrowing years on some of the war's grimmest but forgotten battlefields: the campaign for Rzhev, the bloody struggle to retake Belorussia, and the bitter final fighting in East Prussia. As he traces his experiences from his initial training, through the maelstrom, to final victory, he provides one of the richest and most detailed memoirs of life and warfare on the Eastern Front. Gorbachevsky's panoramic account takes us from infantry specialist school to the front lines to rear services areas and his whirlwind romances in wartime Moscow. He recalls the shriek of Katiusha rockets flying overhead toward the enemy and the unforgettable howl of Stukas divebombing Soviet tanks. And he conveys horrors of brutal fighting not recorded previously in English, including his own participation in a human wave assault that decimated his regiment at Rzhev, with piles of corpses growing the closer they got to the German trenches. Gorbachevsky also records the sufferings of the starving citizens of Leningrad, the savage execution of a Russian scout who turned in false information, the killing of an innocent German trying to welcome the Soviet troops, and a chilling campfire discussion by four Russian soldiers as they compared notes about the women they'd raped. His memoir brims with rich descriptions of daily army life, the challenges of maintaining morale, and relationships between soldiers. It also includes candid exposs of the many problems the Red Army faced: the influence of political officers, the stubbornness of senior commanders, the attrition through desertions, and the initial months of occupation in postwar Germany. Through the Maelstrom features the swiftly moving narrative and rich dialogue associated with the grand style of great Russian literature. Ultimately, it provides a fitting and final testament to soldiers who fought and died in anonymity.

Debating Reform: Conflicting Perspectives on How to Fix the American Political System, Third Edition edited by Richard J. Ellis and Michael Nelson, gets readers to consider the key issues in reforming political institutions. Written specifically for this volume, each pro or con essay is contributed by a top scholar and examines a concrete proposal for reforming the political system. By focusing on institutions, rather than liberal or conservative public policies, the essays move readers to leave behind ideology and grapple with evidence, and then draw their own conclusions and build their own arguments.

Editors Richard J. Ellis and Michael Nelson have once again assembled a cadre of top presidential scholars to offer a series of pro/con essays that will inspire spirited debate in Debating the Presidency: Debating the Presidency: Conflicting Perspectives on the American Executive, Fourth Edition offers a compelling yet concise view of contemporary topics relevant to the American executive. Each pair of debate-resolution style essays is written specifically for this volume, and offers a compelling yet concise view of a topic relevant to the American executive. Editors Richard Ellis and Michael Nelson offer brief chapter introductions that provide context. In this edition, several new arguments are presented on topics such as executive orders (Pro: Gene Healy, Con: Andrew Rudalevige); abolishment of the vice presidency (Pro: Douglas L. Kriner, Con: Joel K. Goldstein); and the effect of new media on the public’s view of the presidency (Pro: Matthew R. Kerbel, Con: Jeffrey E. Cohen).