A basic question: Does the federal government, especially the office of President, have the Constitutional authority to take over private business?
In a word, NO.
James Madison wrote about our new (in 17887) Constitution in The Federalist Papers stating that "The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government are few and defined". This briefly describes the principle of enumerated powers--that the Constitution has stated exactly what prerogatives each of the different branches of federal government may have.
This principle was codified in the Tenth Amendment which says "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."
Of course, the exact meaning and nuances of this amendment has been debated over the years, but the basic deal is that our Constitution limits the powers of our government to what is written in the document.
Let's look at the Constitution to see what are the duties of our President. First look in Article II, Section 1.
Our Constitution gives the executive power to the President. It describes the election of the President (by electors, what we call the electoral college), describes the qualifications, provides for the succession if the President dies, provides for a salary, and delineates the oath of office, and a few other bits and pieces about the office.
Our Constitution then outlines, in Section 2, the powers of the President. He is Commander In Chief, can have advisors, can grant pardons, make treaties (with the consent of the Senate), and can nominate Supreme Court justices, ambassadors, and a few other officials.
So how did our President become the head of General Motors?
We'll look into this a bit more...
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