# Why is POTUS allowed to pardon anyone?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-potus-allowed-to-pardon-anyone/410319
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [July 3, 2007, 3:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-potus-allowed-to-pardon-anyone/410319 "2007-07-03T03:55:51Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Sitnam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sitnam)
#### Post date: [July 3, 2007, 3:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-potus-allowed-to-pardon-anyone/410319/1 "2007-07-03T03:55:51Z")
A Constitutional Democracy is founded on the principle that no one is above the law. Yet its standard practice for all presidents to pardon their buddies minutes before heading out of the Oval Office for the last time. Why was this ever allowed in the first place?
---
### Author:  [@Cunctator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cunctator)
#### Post date: [July 3, 2007, 4:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-potus-allowed-to-pardon-anyone/410319/2 "2007-07-03T04:32:35Z")
A carry over of the traditional royal prerogative to pardon criminals perhaps?
---
### Author:  [@CynicalGabe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CynicalGabe)
#### Post date: [July 3, 2007, 6:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-potus-allowed-to-pardon-anyone/410319/3 "2007-07-03T06:27:39Z")
Because the Constitution says he can. Article II Section 2.
---
### Author:  [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)
#### Post date: [July 3, 2007, 6:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-potus-allowed-to-pardon-anyone/410319/4 "2007-07-03T06:50:58Z")
[QUOTE=CynicalGabe]
Because the Constitution says he can. Article II Section 2.
[/QUOTE]
Why does a law exist? Because a law exists. Nice circular logic there.
---
### Author:  [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)
#### Post date: [July 3, 2007, 7:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-potus-allowed-to-pardon-anyone/410319/5 "2007-07-03T07:06:55Z")
In our system of checks and balances, the executive power to pardon or commute a sentence is a check on the judicial branch.
---
### Author:  [@Odesio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Odesio)
#### Post date: [July 3, 2007, 7:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-potus-allowed-to-pardon-anyone/410319/6 "2007-07-03T07:23:31Z")
[QUOTE=Sitnam]
A Constitutional Democracy is founded on the principle that no one is above the law. Yet its standard practice for all presidents to pardon their buddies minutes before heading out of the Oval Office for the last time. Why was this ever allowed in the first place?
[/QUOTE]
As a check against the judiciary system.
Marc
Edit: Walloon beat me to it.
---
### Author:  [@Rigamarole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rigamarole)
#### Post date: [July 3, 2007, 8:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-potus-allowed-to-pardon-anyone/410319/7 "2007-07-03T08:16:48Z")
[QUOTE=Sitnam]
Yet its standard practice for all presidents to pardon their buddies minutes before heading out of the Oval Office for the last time.
[/QUOTE]
Like who, specifically? Although I am aware of presidential pardons, I never really thought most presidents would have a lot of “buddies” in jail.
---
### Author:  [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)
#### Post date: [July 3, 2007, 8:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-potus-allowed-to-pardon-anyone/410319/8 "2007-07-03T08:39:33Z")
Just for the record,
• [President Clinton’s Pardons, January 2001](http://www.usdoj.gov/opa/pardonchartlst.htm)
• [Pardons and Commutations Granted by President George H.W. Bush, 1989-1993](http://www.usdoj.gov/pardon/bushgrants.htm)
---
### Author:  [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)
#### Post date: [July 3, 2007, 8:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-potus-allowed-to-pardon-anyone/410319/9 "2007-07-03T08:58:22Z")
Bill Clinton: [My Reasons for the Pardons](http://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/18/opinion/18CLIN.html?pagewanted=all&ei=5070&en=66ba82eaf117b24b&ex=1183521600)
---
### Author:  [@Baffle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baffle)
#### Post date: [July 3, 2007, 9:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-potus-allowed-to-pardon-anyone/410319/10 "2007-07-03T09:07:23Z")
Ironically, Scooter Libby is mentioned in that article.
---
### Author:  [@Sitnam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sitnam)
#### Post date: [July 3, 2007, 1:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-potus-allowed-to-pardon-anyone/410319/11 "2007-07-03T13:19:23Z")
[QUOTE=Walloon]
In our system of checks and balances, the executive power to pardon or commute a sentence is a check on the judicial branch.
[/QUOTE]
The few exceptional pardons would be fine in a Roe Vs. Wade or Brown v. Board Of Educ. Of Topeka situation, what’s being done here is wrong. There is a clear correlation between those who get pardons and those who’ve helped take the fall for the Presidents affiliated party.
[QUOTE=Rigamarole]
I never really thought most presidents would have a lot of “buddies” in jail.
[/QUOTE]
You’d be surprised. It isn’t even considered common, it’s expected.
---
### Author:  [@Mahaloth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mahaloth)
#### Post date: [July 3, 2007, 2:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-potus-allowed-to-pardon-anyone/410319/12 "2007-07-03T14:13:20Z")
[QUOTE=Rigamarole]
Like who, specifically? Although I am aware of presidential pardons, I never really thought most presidents would have a lot of “buddies” in jail.
[/QUOTE]
Oh, good Lord!
It’s hard to be President _without_ having friends/associates in prison.
And, yes, as silly as it may seem to someone unfamiliar with our system, the President has incredible power when it comes to pardoning criminals. It’s usually used right at the end of the Presidency as a reward/payback for various favors.
---
### Author:  [@anson2995](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/anson2995)
#### Post date: [July 3, 2007, 2:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-potus-allowed-to-pardon-anyone/410319/13 "2007-07-03T14:16:28Z")
[QUOTE=Sitnam]
what’s being done here is wrong. There is a clear correlation between those who get pardons and those who’ve helped take the fall for the Presidents affiliated party.
[/QUOTE]
If by “here” you’re referring to the Scooter Libby case, I just want to point out that he was not pardoned. The president commuted his sentence. There’s a big difference between the two.
---
### Author:  [@Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freddy_the_Pig)
#### Post date: [July 3, 2007, 2:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-potus-allowed-to-pardon-anyone/410319/14 "2007-07-03T14:25:42Z")
This question gets asked any time there is a remotely controversial pardon, and the answer is always the same: the Framers borrowed it from British practice in recognition of the fact that no system of justice is perfect, and unusual cases sometimes require individual intervention and discretion.
You can read Blackstone’s defense of the British practice [here](http://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/documents/a2_2_1s17.html), although Blackstone, writing in 1769, thought that pardon would be inappropriate in a republic:
> [@](#):
>
> This is indeed one of the great advantages of monarchy in general, above any other form of government; that there is a magistrate, who has it in his power to extend mercy, wherever he thinks it is deserved: holding a court of equity in his own breast, to soften the rigour of the general law, in such criminal cases as merit an exemption from punishment. . . . In democracies, however, this power of pardon can never subsist; for there nothing higher is acknowleged than the magistrate who administers the laws: and it would be impolitic for the power of judging and of pardoning to center in one and the same person.
In the American colonies, the monarchs delegated the power of pardon to their royal governors, and the Constitutional Convention chose to vest it in the President with respect to federal offenses. In Alexander Hamilton’s words,
> [@](#):
>
> \*t is not to be doubted, that a single man of prudence and good sense is better fitted, in delicate conjunctures, to balance the motives which may plead for and against the remission of the punishment, than any numerous body whatever.
If the Framers had understood how vast the reach of federal law would one day become, they might have thought twice about such an unchecked grant of power. They incorrectly anticipated that federal jurisdiction, in criminal matters, would be limited to crimes such as piracy, treason, and smuggling. These are serious matters, of course, but occur less often and involve fewer people than the smorgasbord of federal crimes on the books today.
It should also be noted that the exemption of impeachments from pardon lost most of its bite in crossing the Atlantic. In Britain, Parliament could impose criminal sentences (even death sentences!) in impeachment trials, and thus defeat the sovereign’s power of pardon. In America, conviction upon impeachment only removes the offender from office.
---
### Author:  [@pravnik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pravnik)
#### Post date: [July 3, 2007, 2:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-potus-allowed-to-pardon-anyone/410319/15 "2007-07-03T14:34:15Z")
The rationale as it was stated at the time:
> [@](#):
>
> He is also to be authorized to grant "reprieves and pardons for offenses against the United States, EXCEPT IN CASES OF IMPEACHMENT.‘’ Humanity and good policy conspire to dictate, that the benign prerogative of pardoning should be as little as possible fettered or embarrassed. The criminal code of every country partakes so much of necessary severity, that without an easy access to exceptions in favor of unfortunate guilt, justice would wear a countenance too sanguinary and cruel. As the sense of responsibility is always strongest, in proportion as it is undivided, it may be inferred that a single man would be most ready to attend to the force of those motives which might plead for a mitigation of the rigor of the law, and least apt to yield to considerations which were calculated to shelter a fit object of its vengeance. The reflection that the fate of a fellow-creature depended on his sole fiat, would naturally inspire scrupulousness and caution; the dread of being accused of weakness or connivance, would beget equal circumspection, though of a different kind. On the other hand, as men generally derive confidence from their numbers, they might often encourage each other in an act of obduracy, and might be less sensible to the apprehension of suspicion or censure for an injudicious or affected clemency. On these accounts, one man appears to be a more eligible dispenser of the mercy of government, than a body of men.
Alexander Hamilton, [The Federalist : No. 74](http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/federal/fed74.htm)
---
### Author:  [@Otto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Otto)
#### Post date: [July 3, 2007, 3:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-potus-allowed-to-pardon-anyone/410319/16 "2007-07-03T15:10:05Z")
Probably a stupid and obvious question and probably asked and answered in a dozen threads already, but: under what authority can the President commute a sentence? Is that the “reprieve” part of the “reprieves and pardons” clause or is this under some other authority?
---
### Author:  [@Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freddy_the_Pig)
#### Post date: [July 3, 2007, 3:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-potus-allowed-to-pardon-anyone/410319/17 "2007-07-03T15:41:55Z")
[QUOTE=Otto]
Probably a stupid and obvious question and probably asked and answered in a dozen threads already, but: under what authority can the President commute a sentence? Is that the “reprieve” part of the “reprieves and pardons” clause or is this under some other authority?
[/QUOTE]
Yes, it’s the same; pardons, commutations, stays of execution, general amnesties–all spring from the “power to grant reprieves and pardons for offenses against the United States”.
---
### Author:  [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)
#### Post date: [July 3, 2007, 3:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-potus-allowed-to-pardon-anyone/410319/18 "2007-07-03T15:48:22Z")
[QUOTE=Freddy the Pig]
If the Framers had understood how vast the reach of federal law would one day become, they might have thought twice about such an unchecked grant of power. They incorrectly anticipated that federal jurisdiction, in criminal matters, would be limited to crimes such as piracy, treason, and smuggling. These are serious matters, of course, but occur less often and involve fewer people than the smorgasbord of federal crimes on the books today.
[/QUOTE]
Good point. It should also be noted, though, that most states grant governors the same power, and in a lot of cases it was these same “framers” who framed the state constitutions. Was that power added later (for those states originally part of the union when the constitution was adopted)?
---
### Author:  [@Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freddy_the_Pig)
#### Post date: [July 3, 2007, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-potus-allowed-to-pardon-anyone/410319/19 "2007-07-03T16:29:56Z")
[QUOTE=John Mace]
Good point. It should also be noted, though, that most states grant governors the same power, and in a lot of cases it was these same “framers” who framed the state constitutions. Was that power added later (for those states originally part of the union when the constitution was adopted)?
[/QUOTE]
I don’t know. I suspect there was a lot of variation. This article from the [American Criminal Law Review](http://goliath.ecnext.com/coms2/summary_0199-1828902_ITM) states:
> [@](#):
>
> After the American Revolution, due to the general mistrust on the part of its drafters of such plenary power vested in an executive, the Articles of Confederation divided the pardon power between the local governor and the state legislature and sometimes even vested the pardon power in the legislature alone. This distrust of a unified pardon power softened by the time the Constitutional Convention convened.
The reference to the Articles of Confederation is nonsense–no doubt he means the state constitutional conventions which met in the aftermath of the Revolution. Such an egregious error makes me wonder if the article is to be trusted. But in general, I think he’s right–the tendency during the Revolution was to circumscribe the power of governors (New York hardly even had one), and I’d be surprised if many had a plenary power of pardon. Even today, as some of our law dopers discussed not long ago, the power doesn’t exist in some states and is circumscribed in others.
---
### Author:  [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)
#### Post date: [July 3, 2007, 4:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-potus-allowed-to-pardon-anyone/410319/20 "2007-07-03T16:54:53Z")
[QUOTE=Sitnam]
The few exceptional pardons would be fine in a Roe Vs. Wade or Brown v. Board Of Educ. Of Topeka situation
[/QUOTE]
😕 There couldn’t be pardons. Neither of those were criminal cases.