Executive Order 10957 Constitutional Neutral (+0.02)

Executive Order 10957—Assigning Authority With Respect to Ordering Persons and Units in the Ready Reserve to Active Duty and With Respect to the Extension of Enlistments and Other Periods of Service in the Armed Forces

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Thursday, August 10, 1961

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1 min read (286 words)

Plain-English Translation & Framers' Constitutional Analysis

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

This executive order, signed by President John F. Kennedy on 1961-08-10, establishes federal administrative policy concerning "Assigning Authority With Respect to Ordering Persons and Units in the Ready Reserve to Active Duty and With Respect to the Extension of Enlistments and Other Periods of Service in the Armed Forces." It outlines operative directives for executive department officers, delegating enforcement responsibilities and establishing official governance guidelines.

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

▪ Formal executive instruction issued by the President establishing official administrative policy on Assigning Authority With Respect to Ordering Persons and Units in the Ready Reserve to Active Duty and With Respect to the Extension of Enlistments and Other Periods of Service in the Armed Forces.

Constitutional & Societal Entities Impacted

🏛️ Armed Forces & Military Establishments 🏛️ Executive Departments & Federal Civil Servants 🏛️ Private Citizens & Property Owners

Total Words

286

1,625 characters

Estimated Read Time

1 min

@ 200 words / min

Flesch-Kincaid

21.7

Post-Grad reading level

Constitutional Polarity

+0.02

Framers' Alignment index

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Scholarly & Legal Citations

Exec. Order No. 10957, John F. Kennedy (Aug 10, 1961). Available at https://executiveordersarchive.org/orders/app-executive-order-10957-assigning-authority-with-respect-ordering-persons-and-units-the.

Official Document Text

Source: The American Presidency Project (UCSB Archive)

Original Source →

By virtue of the authority vested in me by the Joint Resolution of August 1, 1961 (P.L. 87-117), and by section 301 of title 3 of the United States Code, and as President of the United States, it is hereby ordered as follows: SECTION 1. The Secretary of Defense, and, when designated by him for this purpose, any of the Secretaries of the military departments of the Department of Defense, are hereby authorized and empowered to exercise the authority vested in the President until July 1,1962, by section 1 of the Act of August 1, 1961 (Public Law 87-117) to order, without the consent of the persons concerned, any unit, and any member not assigned to a unit organized to serve as a unit, in the Ready Reserve of an armed force to active duty for not more than 12 consecutive months, provided there are not more than 250,000 members of the Ready Reserve thereby on active duty (other than for training) without their consent at any one time. However, the Secretary of Defense may not order any unit in the Ready Reserve of an armed force to active duty, other than active duty for training, under this section without the approval of the President. SEC. 2. In pursuance of the provisions of section 2 of the said Joint Resolution of August 1, 1961, the Secretary of Defense is hereby authorized to extend enlistments, appointments, periods of active duty, periods of active duty for training, periods of obligated service, or other military status, in any component of an armed force or in the National Guard that expire before July l, 1962, for not more than twelve months. JOHN F. KENNEDY THE WHITE HOUSE, August 10, 1961