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Executive Orders Historical Archive
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Executive Order 2681 ⚖️✨ Zone 2: Zone of Twilight Constitutional Neutral (+0.02) 📜 Art. II §2: Commander-in-Chief Supervisory Authority

Executive Order 2681—Authority to Organize Food Administration Grain Corporation

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Tuesday, August 14, 1917
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4 min read (858 words)

Executive Brief • At a Glance

⏱️ 4 min read (858 words) • ● In Effect
🎯 Primary Mandate

An agency, to wit, a corporation, under the laws of Delaware, be created, said corporation to be named Food Administration Grain Corporation.

⚖️ Constitutional Footing
⚖️✨ Zone 2: Zone of Twilight
Concurrent Authority / Congressional Silence
📜 Art. II §2: Commander-in-Chief Supervisory Authority
🏛️ Scope & Affected Sectors
Armed Forces & Military Establishments Merchants, Importers & Commercial Enterprises Sovereign State Governments & Localities Executive Departments & Federal Civil Servants

Plain-English Translation & Framers' Constitutional Analysis

Early Statesman synthesis distilling legal jargon into practical meaning, statutory anchors, and structural constitutional impacts.

Signed by President Woodrow Wilson on August 14, 1917, this order concerns Authority to Organize Food Administration Grain Corporation. An agency, to wit, a corporation, under the laws of Delaware, be created, said corporation to be named Food Administration Grain Corporation. That the governing body of said corporation shall consist of a board of directors composed of seven members.

Constitutional Assessment: Scrutinized through Article II, Section 2, this action exercises the President's constitutional role as Commander in Chief. Early Framers recognized broad executive discretion in commanding military forces during conflict, provided it remains bounded by congressional declarations and respects civilian domestic courts.

Key Directives & Operative Actions

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An agency, to wit, a corporation, under the laws of Delaware, be created, said corporation to be named Food Administration Grain Corporation.

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That the governing body of said corporation shall consist of a board of directors composed of seven members.

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That the following persons, having been invited and given their consent to serve, shall be named as four of said directors, to wit: Herbert Hoover, of Washington, D. C. Julius H. Barnes, of Duluth, Minn. Gates W. McGarrah, of New York, N. Y. Frank G. Crowell, of Kansas City, Mo.

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The remaining three shall be named by the incorporators and be subject to change by and with the approval of the President.

Constitutional & Societal Entities Impacted

🏛️ Armed Forces & Military Establishments 🏛️ Merchants, Importers & Commercial Enterprises 🏛️ Sovereign State Governments & Localities 🏛️ Executive Departments & Federal Civil Servants
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The Framers' Constitutional Council

1787 Prism

Evaluating this order against the constitutional debates of 1787 and the limits of Article II executive power.

⚖️✨ Zone 2 (Zone of Twilight)
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"When the President acts in absence of either a congressional grant or denial of authority, he can only rely upon his own independent powers, but there is a zone of twilight in which he and Congress may have concurrent authority."

— Justice Robert H. Jackson, Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer (1952) Concurrent Authority / Congressional Silence
JM

James Madison

Separation of Powers & Legislative Primacy

"Power is of an encroaching nature, and it ought to be effectually restrained from passing the limits assigned to it." — Federalist No. 48 (1788)

Madison would view this order with watchful scrutiny. Operating in the 'Zone of Twilight' where Congress is silent, each such directive establishes an administrative precedent that steadily expands the executive perimeter at the expense of legislative primacy.

Madisonian Stance: Vigilant / Cautionary
AH

Alexander Hamilton

The Energetic Executive & Unified Command

"The direction of war implies the direction of the common strength; and the power of directing and employing the common strength must be under the direction of the single hand of the Executive." — Federalist No. 74 (1788)

Hamilton would forcefully champion executive discretion here. For foreign entanglements, commerce defense, and national security, deliberative assemblies are too slow and faction-ridden. A unified, energetic Executive exercising swift command is precisely what the Philadelphia Convention intended for national preservation.

Hamiltonian Stance: Strong Prerogative Support
GM

George Mason

Bill of Rights, Due Process & 10th Amendment

"The president will be surrounded by flatterers and sycophants... and the great powers of the executive will gradually absorb the liberties of the people." — Cato IV (Anti-Federalist, 1787)

The Anti-Federalist prism advises continuous democratic vigilance. Even routine administrative directives aggregate centralized federal power away from town halls and state assemblies toward a distant executive apparatus.

Anti-Federalist Stance: Eternal Vigilance Required
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Five Measurable "Constitutional Friction" Dimensions

An objective audit measuring potential separation-of-powers tension against the United States Constitution and established Supreme Court doctrine.

⚖️ Discretionary Twilight Zone
42 / 100 friction index
Dimension 1 • Art. I, §1 & §8

Legislative Encroachment & Purse

Moderate Friction

Administers commerce or fiscal programs requiring ongoing statutory delegation and legislative oversight.

Benchmark: Power of the purse, taxes/tariffs, and rule of law reserved to Congress.
Dimension 2 • Art. II, §1 & §3

Executive Scope & Faithfulness

Low Friction

Exercises standard supervisory executive authority to faithfully execute existing statutes.

Benchmark: Faithfully execute laws enacted by Congress vs. unilateral decree.
Dimension 3 • 10th Amendment

Federalism & State Sovereignty

Moderate Friction

Engages state and local partners in cooperative federalism programs.

Benchmark: Police powers and un-delegated responsibilities reserved to the States.
Dimension 4 • 5th & 14th Amendments

Due Process & Individual Rights

Moderate Friction

Applies regulatory or compliance standards to private contractors or commercial entities.

Benchmark: Protection of private property, contracts, liberty, and procedural justice.
Dimension 5 • Separation of Powers

Youngstown Jacksonian Tier

Moderate Friction

The order relies on inherent Article II executive discretion, civil service management, or foreign diplomacy where Congress has neither expressly approved nor prohibited action.

Benchmark: Concurrent Authority / Congressional Silence
⚖️ Audit Synthesis

This order operates within Justice Jackson’s Zone of Twilight, resting upon concurrent presidential authority or congressional silence.

Weighted composite: Art. I (25%), Art. II (25%), Federalism (15%), Due Process (15%), Youngstown (20%).
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How to read these dimensions: Executive power expands whenever an administration acts without explicit statutory authorization from Congress (Article I), touches upon police powers historically reserved to the states (Tenth Amendment), or limits private rights and property without judicial process. A low friction score indicates strict concordance with enacted law; a high friction score highlights orders testing the limits of presidential discretion.
Total Words
858
5,262 characters
Estimated Read Time
4 min
@ 200 words / min
Flesch-Kincaid
20.3
Post-Graduate Legal
Language Tone Score
+0.02
Constitutional Neutral
How is this scored?
Text size:

Official Archival Text

View Source Document

Whereas, under and by virtue of an act of Congress entitled "An act to provide for the national security and defense by encouraging the production, conserving the supply and controlling the distribution of food products and fuel" approved August 10, 1917, it is provided among other things as follows: That, by reason of the existence of a state of war, it is essential to the national security and defense, for the successful prosecution of the war, and for the support and maintenance of the Army and Navy, to assure an adequate supply and equitable distribution, and to facilitate the movement, of foods, feeds, fuel, including fuel oil and natural gas, fertilizer and fertilizer ingredients, tools, utensils, implements, machinery and equipment required for the actual production of foods, feeds, and fuel hereafter in this act called necessaries, to prevent, locally or generally, scarcity, monopolization, hoarding, injurious speculation, manipulation, and private controls, affecting such supply, distribution, and movement, and to establish and maintain governmental control of such necessaries during the war. For such purposes the instrumentalities, means, methods, powers, authorities, duties, obligations, and prohibitions hereinafter set forth are created, established, conferred, and prescribed. The President is authorized to make such regulations and to issue such orders as are essential effectively to carry out the provisions of this act. That in carrying out the purposes of this act the President is authorized to create and use any agency or agencies. That the President is authorized from time to time to purchase, to store, to provide storage facilities for and to sell for cash at reasonable prices, wheat, flour, meal, beans, and potatoes. And whereas, in order to enable the United States Food Administration acting under the direction of the President to efficiently exercise the authority granted by said act, and to purchase, store, provide storage facilities for and to sell for cash at reasonable prices the commodities above named, and to enable said United States Food Administration to purchase and sell said commodities in the manner and by methods customarily followed in the trade, it is expedient and necessary that a corporation should be organized, all the stock of which, except the number of shares necessary to qualify directors or incorporators, shall be subscribed for, purchased, and owned by the United States. Now, therefore, under and by virtue of the power conferred upon me by the above-entitled act as hereinbefore set forth, it is hereby ordered that an agency, to wit, a corporation, under the laws of Delaware, be created, said corporation to be named Food Administration Grain Corporation. That the governing body of said corporation shall consist of a board of directors composed of seven members. That the following persons, having been invited and given their consent to serve, shall be named as four of said directors, to wit: Herbert Hoover, of Washington, D. C. Julius H. Barnes, of Duluth, Minn. Gates W. McGarrah, of New York, N. Y. Frank G. Crowell, of Kansas City, Mo. The remaining three shall be named by the incorporators and be subject to change by and with the approval of the President. The office and principal place of business of said corporation outside of the State of Delaware shall be at the city of New York, and branch offices shall be established at such places within the United States as may be selected and determined by the United States Food Administrator, by and with the consent of the President. That the capital stock of such corporation shall consist of 500,000 shares of the par value of $100 each. That the United States shall purchase from time to time at par so much of said capital stock as may be deemed necessary to supply the necessary capital to enable said corporation to carry on its business and none of said capital stock shall be sold to any person other than the United States and to the individual directors or incorporators, for the purpose of qualifying as such directors or incorporators, such qualifying shares to be held by said directors or incorporators in trust for the use and benefit of the United States. The United States Food Administrator is hereby directed to cause said corporation to be formed, with the powers contained in the articles or certificate of incorporation, and in the by-laws requisite and necessary to define the methods by which said corporation shall conduct its business which have been approved by the President. All officers of said corporation shall be selected with the consent and approval of the President. The United States Food Administrator is hereby authorized and directed to subscribe for and purchase all of said capital stock in the name of and for the use and benefit of the United States and as purchased to pay for the same out of the appropriation of $150,000,000 authorized by section 19 of the act of Congress hereinbefore entitled. Done in the District of Columbia this fourteenth day of August, in the year of our Lord one thousand nine hundred and seventeen and of the independence of the United States of America the one hundred and forty-second. WOODROW WILSON

THE WHITE HOUSE, #signature

August 14, 1917.

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Scholarly & Legal Citations

Exec. Order No. 2681 (Aug. 14, 1917), https://executiveordersarchive.org/orders/app-executive-order-2681-authority-organize-food-administration-grain-corporation.