Dick Cheney’s death this week has reignited debate over one of his most enduring legacies: his drive to strengthen the presidency. As vice president under George W. Bush, Cheney waged a quiet but relentless effort to reclaim powers he believed Congress had wrongly stripped away after Watergate and the Vietnam War. Two decades later, President Trump is carrying that philosophy further, using the same legal and institutional openings Cheney helped create to consolidate control over the executive branch, the New York Times reported.

The roots of an imperial presidency

Cheney’s vision dated back to the 1970s, when he served as chief of staff to President Gerald Ford and watched Congress impose new limits on the White House. Convinced those reforms weakened the executive, he spent the rest of

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