Britannica.com: Encyclopedia Article on Executive Agreement An executive agreement[1] is an agreement between heads of government of two or more nations that has not been ratified by the legislature since the treaties are ratified. Executive agreements are considered politically binding to distinguish them from legally binding contracts. Note: An executive agreement does not have the same weight as a treaty, unless it is supported by a joint resolution. Unlike a treaty, an executive agreement may succeed an adversarial state law, but not a federal law. Executive agreement, an agreement between the United States and a foreign government that is less formal than a treaty and is not subject to the constitutional requirement for ratification by two-thirds of the U.S. Senate. The Case-Zablocki Act of 1972 requires the President to notify the Senate within 60 days of an executive agreement. The president`s powers to conclude such agreements have not been restricted. The reporting requirement allowed Congress to vote in favor of repealing an executive agreement or to refuse funding for its implementation. [3] [4] Most executive agreements were concluded on the basis of a contract or deed by Congress. However, presidents have sometimes reached executive agreements to achieve goals that would not find the support of two-thirds of the Senate. For example, after the outbreak of World War II, but before the Americans entered the conflict, President Franklin D. Roosevelt negotiated an executive agreement that gave the United Kingdom 50 obsolete destroyers in exchange for 99-year leases on some British naval bases in the Atlantic.

Executive agreements are often used to circumvent the requirements of national constitutions for treaty ratification. Many nations that are republics with written constitutions have constitutional rules on treaty ratification. The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe is based on executive agreements. The implementation of executive agreements increased considerably after 1939. Prior to 1940, the U.S. Senate had ratified 800 treaties and presidents had concluded 1,200 executive agreements; From 1940 to 1989, during World War II and the Cold War, presidents signed nearly 800 treaties, but concluded more than 13,000 executive treaties. In the United States, executive agreements are made exclusively by the President of the United States. They are one of three mechanisms through which the United States makes binding international commitments.

Some authors view executive agreements as treaties of international law because they bind both the United States and another sovereign state. However, under U.S. constitutional law, executive agreements are not considered treaties within the meaning of the contractual clause of the U.S. Constitution, which requires the Council and the approval of two-thirds of the Senate to be considered a treaty. The U.S. Supreme Court Pink (1942) found that international agreements, which were concluded in law, have the same legal status as treaties and do not require Senate approval. To Reid v. Concealed (1957), the Tribunal, while reaffirming the President`s ability to enter into executive agreements, found that such agreements could not be contrary to existing federal law or the Constitution.

The U.S. Constitution does not explicitly give a president the power to enter into executive agreements. However, it may be authorized to do so by Congress or may do so on the basis of its foreign relations management authority. Despite questions about the constitutionality of executive agreements, the Supreme Court ruled in 1937 that they had the same force as treaties. As executive agreements are made on the authority of the president-in-office, they do not necessarily bind his successors.