ABSTRACT
DR. SMYTH, making another dig at my method of analysis: Since, at our last session, you seemed unable to draw a clear line between legislative, executive, and judicial powers, I am prepared to hear you say tonight that since 1933 President Franklin Roosevelt has constitutional warrant for seizing all the power he can get his hands on. The line cannot be drawn; hence he can draw it to suit himself. Furthermore, according to your theory, or whatever you may call it, the opinions of the Supreme Court vary, so that we cannot rely on that body to define and hold positive limits on the executive power. In short, all talk about the division of powers which we heard in grade school and have heard ever after is worse than deceptive; it is nonsense. If I am to take your views at face value, political power is a dark continent that has no external boundary of its own, physical or intellectual; and within this dark continent covered with mist there are no boundaries either—at least no boundaries that we can be sure of. Before we begin I wish that you would tell me in simple words, just what the President of the United States is.
