Donald Trump has done plenty of this in his first days as president, signing seven executive orders.
It's not unusual for one party or the other to accuse a president of abusing executive power. But to put it in perspective, The American Presidency Project at the University of California, Santa Barbara, keeps a running tab on executive orders. Using its numbers, we have listed the presidents two ways:
Presidents listed by total number of executive orders:
President | Years in Office | Orders | Annual Average | |
Franklin D. Roosevelt | 12.12 | 3,721 | 307 | |
Woodrow Wilson | 8 | 1,803 | 225 | |
Calvin Coolidge | 5.59 | 1,203 | 215 | |
Theodore Roosevelt | 7.47 | 1,081 | 145 | |
Herbert Hoover | 4 | 968 | 242 | |
Harry S. Truman | 7.78 | 907 | 117 | |
William Howard Taft | 4 | 724 | 181 | |
Warren G. Harding | 2.4 | 522 | 217 | |
Dwight D. Eisenhower | 8 | 484 | 61 | |
Ronald Reagan | 8 | 381 | 48 | |
William J. Clinton | 8 | 364 | 46 | |
Richard Nixon | 5.5 | 346 | 62 | |
Lyndon B. Johnson | 5.17 | 325 | 63 | |
Jimmy Carter | 4 | 320 | 80 | |
George W. Bush | 8 | 291 | 36 | |
Barack Obama | 8 | 276 | 35 | |
Ulysses S. Grant | 8 | 217 | 27 | |
John F. Kennedy | 2.8 | 214 | 75 | |
William McKinley | 4.5 | 185 | 41 | |
Gerald R. Ford | 2.4 | 169 | 69 | |
George H.W. Bush | 4 | 166 | 42 | |
Benjamin Harrison | 4 | 143 | 36 | |
Grover Cleveland - II * | 4 | 140 | 35 | |
Grover Cleveland - I | 4 | 113 | 28 | |
Chester Arthur | 3.4 | 96 | 28 | |
Rutherford B. Hayes | 4 | 92 | 23 | |
Andrew Johnson | 3.8 | 79 | 20 | |
Abraham Lincoln | 4.1 | 48 | 12 | |
Franklin Pierce | 4 | 35 | 9 | |
James K. Polk | 4 | 18 | 5 | |
John Tyler | 4 | 17 | 4 | |
James Buchanan | 4 | 16 | 4 | |
Millard Fillmore | 2.6 | 12 | 5 | |
Andrew Jackson | 8 | 12 | 2 | |
Martin van Buren | 4 | 10 | 3 | |
George Washington | 7.8 | 8 | 1 | |
James Garfield | 0.5 | 6 | 11 | |
Zachary Taylor | 1.3 | 5 | 4 | |
Thomas Jefferson | 8 | 4 | 0.5 | |
John Quincy Adams | 4 | 3 | 1 | |
John Adams | 4 | 1 | 0.25 | |
|
8 | 1 | 0.13 | |
James Monroe | 8 | 1 | 0.13 | |
William Henry Harrison | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Presidents listed by average number of executive orders per year:
President | Annual Average | ||||
Franklin D. Roosevelt | 307 | ||||
Herbert Hoover | 242 | ||||
Woodrow Wilson | 225 | ||||
Warren G. Harding | 217 | ||||
Calvin Coolidge | 215 | ||||
William Howard Taft | 181 | ||||
Theodore Roosevelt | 145 | ||||
Harry S. Truman | 117 | ||||
Jimmy Carter | 80 | ||||
John F. Kennedy | 75 | ||||
Gerald R. Ford | 69 | ||||
Lyndon B. Johnson | 63 | ||||
Richard Nixon | 62 | ||||
Dwight D. Eisenhower | 61 | ||||
Ronald Reagan | 48 | ||||
William J. Clinton | 46 | ||||
George H.W. Bush | 42 | ||||
William McKinley | 41 | ||||
George W. Bush | 36 | ||||
Benjamin Harrison | 36 | ||||
Barack Obama | 35 | ||||
Grover Cleveland - II | 35 | ||||
Grover Cleveland - I | 28 | ||||
Chester Arthur | 28 | ||||
Ulysses S. Grant | 27 | ||||
Rutherford B. Hayes | 23 | ||||
Andrew Johnson | 20 | ||||
Abraham Lincoln | 12 | ||||
James Garfield | 11 | ||||
Franklin Pierce | 9 | ||||
James K. Polk | 5 | ||||
Millard Fillmore | 5 | ||||
John Tyler | 4 | ||||
James Buchanan | 4 | ||||
Zachary Taylor | 4 | ||||
Martin van Buren | 3 | ||||
Andrew Jackson | 2 | ||||
George Washington | 1 | ||||
John Quincy Adams | 1 | ||||
Thomas Jefferson | 0.5 | ||||
John Adams | 0.25 | ||||
James Madison | 0.13 | ||||
|
0.13 | ||||
William Henry Harrison | 0 |
*Cleveland is listed twice because he served non-consecutive terms.
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