President Biden is signing too many executive orders

Ever since President Biden took office, it seems there are two or three new Executive Orders signed every day. Just for clarity, an Executive Order is basically an order the president gives to make people do things. For the agencies, (State, Defense, Treasury, etc.) under the President these orders have the force of law. In the first week of his presidency, Biden set a record for the most executive orders signed by a President with 22. In fact, he signed double the executive orders in his first week compared to the previous 7 administrations combined (11).  

Obviously, President Biden is in office in one of the most perilous of times and is faced with unprecedented challenges. America is embroiled in a pandemic, a stagnant economy, continuing wars overseas, heightened racial strife, ineptitude from the previous administration, and a coup attempt characterized by ongoing domestic terrorism. President Biden had to reverse many actions from Trump as well as set the agenda to face down these challenges. So his eagerness to get out in front and lead forcefully through executive action is understandable.

However, it is also a commentary that the President has little or no confidence that Congress will be able to pass legislation to address these issues. The last congressional session (the 116th) was the least productive Congress in a half a century and despite being consigned to the minority Republicans still have significant ability to stifle lawmaking. In recent years the way for a President to get around this quandary is simply to pass executive orders.

The problem is continued use of executive orders has the potential to upset the checks and balances of the American system. American governance was designed and refined into a system in which the three branches of governance contest with each other to ensure that no one branch has too much power. If the President accrues too much power he or she becomes a dictator. The only way the Legislative Branch of government checks the dictatorial potential of the president is to actually do its job and legislate. Unfortunately, Congress has been loath to provide any legislative solution to any of the pressing issues that face our nation. Congress is so polarized that even the passing of a budget has become a tenuous affair. It is now a commonplace occurrence for America to be on the verge of a shutdown every time a budget must be passed. 

Since we have a two party system, this highlights the importance of having two functioning and healthy political parties which are not only based in reality, but are actually interested in governing as opposed to obstructing. Currently, we have the Republican party which only made modest accomplishments when it was in control of all three branches of government. If they resort to being an obstructionist party instead of finding productive ways to compromise, they threaten the efficacy of Congress to legislate and act as a check on the Executive.

This is how increased partisan polarization is a serious threat to American democracy. As long as Congress remains gridlocked, the President will be incentivized to lead through executive orders. As the president increasingly leads through executive orders more power accrues to the President and makes it more likely that future presidents will use the executive order ever more frequently while Congress becomes a lesser branch mired in gridlock. Make no mistake, I am not blaming Joe Biden for this, he is simply responding to the situation he finds himself in. However, given that America just survived a brazen attempt at dictatorship from the previous president it is not unthinkable that a president with a different disposition and potentially a different agenda may use the precedent being set to take America even closer to dictatorship.