psc 303 final

• Did the Florida Supreme Court violate Article II Section 1 Clause 2 of
• the U.S. Constitution by making new election law? Do standardless manual
• recounts violate the Equal Protection and Due Process Clauses of the
• Constitution?
• Noting that the Equal Protection clause guarantees individuals that
• their ballots cannot be devalued by "later arbitrary and disparate
• treatment," the per curiam opinion held 7-2 that the Florida Supreme
• Court's scheme for recounting ballots was unconstitutional. Even if the
• recount was fair in theory, it was unfair in practice. The record
• suggested that different standards were applied from ballot to ballot,
• precinct to precinct, and county to county. Because of those and other
• procedural difficulties, the court held that no constitutional recount
• could be fashioned in the time remaining (which was short because the
• Florida legislature wanted to take advantage of the "safe harbor"
• provided by 3 USC Section 5). Loathe to make broad precedents, the per
• curiam opinion limited its holding to the present case. Rehnquist (in a
• concurring opinion joined by Scalia and Thomas) argued that the recount
• scheme was also unconstitutional because the Florida Supreme Court's
• decision made new election law, which only the state legislature may do.
• Breyer and Souter (writing separately) agreed with the per curiam
• holding that the Florida Court's recount scheme violated the Equal
• Protection Clause, but they dissented with respect to the remedy,
• believing that a constitutional recount could be fashioned. Time is
• insubstantial when constitutional rights are at stake. Ginsburg and
• Stevens (writing separately) argued that for reasons of federalism, the
• Florida Supreme Court's decision ought to be respected. Moreover, the
• Florida decision was fundamentally right; the Constitution requires that
• every vote be counted.

Facts of the Case

• Suspecting a plot against Justice Stephen J.
• Field's life, the U.S. Attorney General appointed Neagle, a U.S.
• Marshall, to protect him. Acting as Field's bodyguard, Neagle shot and
• killed a man who appeared about to attack the justice. After California
• officials arrested and jailed Neagle, the U.S. sought his release by a
• writ of habeas corpus.

Question

• Was the state obligated to obey the writ even
• though no national statute empowered the Attorney General to provide
• judges with bodyguards?

Conclusion

• Yes. The Court held that the Attorney General
• acted appropriately since assigning Neagle as Field's bodyguard assured
• that the nation's laws would be faithfully executed. Furthermore,
• Neagle's actions were consistent with a congressional statute which
• provided U.S. Marshalls with "the same powers, in executing the laws" as
• state sheriffs and deputies (who would have been allowed to deter an
• attack on Field's life).

• This case consolidates two separate challenges to the constitutionality
• of two cancellations, made by President William J. Clinton, under the
• Line Item Veto Act ("Act"). In the first, the City of New York, two
• hospital associations, a hospital, and two health care unions,
• challenged the President's cancellation of a provision in the Balanced
• Budget Act of 1997 which relinquished the Federal Government's ability
• to recoup nearly $2.6 billion in taxes levied against Medicaid providers
• by the State of New York.

Question

• Did the President's ability to selectively cancel
• individual portions of bills, under the Line Item Veto Act, violate the
• Presentment Clause of Article I?
• Yes. In a 6-to-3 decision the Court first established that both the City
• of New York, and its affiliates, and the farmers' cooperative suffered
• sufficiently immediate and concrete injuries to sustain their standing
• to challenge the President's actions. The Court then explained that
• under the Presentment Clause, legislation that passes both Houses of
• Congress must either be entirely approved (i.e. signed) or rejected
• (i.e. vetoed) by the President. The Court held that by canceling only
• selected portions of the bills at issue, under authority granted him by
• the Act, the President in effect "amended" the laws before him. Such
• discretion, the Court concluded, violated the "finely wrought"
• legislative procedures of Article I as envisioned by the Framers.

Facts of the Case

• The Ethics in Government Act of 1978 created a
• special court and empowered the Attorney General to recommend to that
• court the appointment of an "independent counsel" to investigate, and,
• if necessary, prosecute government officials for certain violations of
• federal criminal laws.

Question


Did the Act violate the constitutional principal of separation of powers?

• The Court addressed a number of constitutional issues in this case and
• upheld the law. The near-unanimous Court held that the means of
• selecting the independent counsel did not violate the Appointments
• Clause; the powers allocated to the special court did not violate
• Article III; and the Act was not offensive to the separation of powers
• doctrine since it did not impermissibly interfere with the functions of
• the Executive Branch.

• he Ethics in Government
• Act of 1978 (aka the Independent
• Counsel Act) created a special court
• and empowered the Attorney General to recommend to that court the
• appointment of an independent counsel to investigate, and
• prosecute government officials for certain violations of Federal criminal
• laws.An independent counsel could not be fired except for cause.The appointment was not by
• the President, and was not subject to the approval of Congress.And independent counsel was appointed to investigate Olson. Olson
• argued that the Ethics in Government Act was
• unconstitutional.Olsen argued that that the independent
• counsel violated the Appointments
• Clause because it was an executive
• branch office that was not appointed by the President.In addition, it was a violation
• of Article III and the separation of powers doctrine because it gave
• judicial powers to a court created by the executive branch. It was sort of a hybrid
• "fourth branch" of government that was ultimately answerable
• to no one.Olsen argued that the broad
• powers of the independent counsel
• could be easily abused, or corrupted by partisanship.The US Supreme Court found the
• Ethics in Government Act to be
• constitutional.The US Supreme Court found
• that the means of selecting the independent counsel did not violate the
• Appointments Clause, Article III, or the separation of powers doctrine
• since it did not impermissibly interfere with the functions of the
• Executive Branch.Since the independent
• counsel was an inferior officer, his
• appointment did not have to come from the President.Since the independent
• counsel could only be fired for
• cause, subject to judicial review, it's a pretty secure position. The
• President can fire the Attorney General at will. So, it could be argued
• that the independent counsel
• was a principle officer, and should only be appointed by the President.The Court felt that the Act
• did not violate the separation of powers doctrine by increasing the power
• of one branch at the expense of another. Instead, even though the
• President could not directly fire the independent counsel, the person holding that office was still an
• Executive Branch officer, not under the control of either Congress or the
• Courts.

Facts of the Case

• President Hoover appointed, and the Senate
• confirmed, Humphrey as a commissioner of the Federal Trade Commission
• (FTC). In 1933, President Roosevelt asked for Humphrey's resignation
• since the latter was a conservative and had jurisdiction over many of
• Roosevelt's New Deal policies. When Humphrey refused to resign,
• Roosevelt fired him because of his policy positions. However, the FTC
• Act only allowed a president to remove a commissioner for "inefficiency,
• neglect of duty, or malfeasance in office." Since Humphrey died shortly
• after being dismissed, his executor sued to recover Humphrey's lost
• salary.

Question


Did section 1 of the Federal Trade Commission Act unconstitutionally interfere with the executive power of the President?






Conclusion

• Decision: 9 votes for Humphrey's Executor, 0 vote(s) against
• Legal provision: US Const Art 1 and 2; Federal Trade Commission Act

• The unanimous Court found that the FTC Act was
• constitutional and that Humphrey's dismissal on policy grounds was
• unjustified. The Court reasoned that the Constitution had never given
• "illimitable power of removal" to the president. Justice Sutherland
• dismissed the government's main line of defense in this case which
• relied heavily on the Court's decision in Meyers v. United States
• (1926). In that case the Court upheld the president's right to remove
• officers who were "units of the executive department." The FTC was
• different, argued Sutherland, because it was a body created by Congress
• to perform quasi- legislative and judicial functions. The Meyers
• precedent, therefore, did not apply in this situation.

Facts of the Case

• A grand jury returned indictments against seven
• of President Richard Nixon's closest aides in the Watergate affair. The
• special prosecutor appointed by Nixon and the defendants sought audio
• tapes of conversations recorded by Nixon in the Oval Office. Nixon
• asserted that he was immune from the subpoena claiming "executive
• privilege," which is the right to withhold information from other
• government branches to preserve confidential communications within the
• executive branch or to secure the national interest. Decided together
• with Nixon v. United States.

Question

• Is the President's right to safeguard certain
• information, using his "executive privilege" confidentiality power,
• entirely immune from judicial review?

• No. The Court held that neither the doctrine of separation of powers,
• nor the generalized need for confidentiality of high-level
• communications, without more, can sustain an absolute, unqualified,
• presidential privilege. The Court granted that there was a limited
• executive privilege in areas of military or diplomatic affairs, but gave
• preference to "the fundamental demands of due process of law in the
• fair administration of justice." Therefore, the president must obey the
• subpoena and produce the tapes and documents. Nixon resigned shortly
• after the release of the tapes.

Facts of the Case

• In 1867, Congress passed the Reconstruction Acts.
• Although President Andrew Johnson vetoed the Acts, Congress overrode
• the veto. In an attempt to delay or prevent Reconstruction, the state of
• Mississippi appealed directly to the Supreme Court. Mississippi asked
• the Court for an injunction preventing the President from enforcing the
• Acts on the ground that they were unconstitutional.

Question


Could the Supreme Court constitutionally issue an injunction directed against the President?






Conclusion

• In a unanimous decision, the Court held that it
• had "no jurisdiction of a bill to enjoin the President in the
• performance of his official duties...." The Court held that the duties
• of the President as required by the Reconstruction Acts were "in no
• sense ministerial," and that a judicial attempt to interfere with the
• performance of such duties would be "an absurd and excessive
• extravagance." The Court noted that if the President chose to ignore the
• injunction, the judiciary would be unable to enforce the order.

Facts of the Case

• In 1968, Fitzgerald, then a civilian analyst with
• the United States Air Force, testified before a congressional committee
• about inefficiencies and cost overruns in the production of the C-5A
• transport plane. Roughly one year later he was fired, an action for
• which President Nixon took responsibility. Fitzgerald then sued Nixon
• for damages after the Civil Service Commission concluded that his
• dismissal was unjust.

Question


Was the President immune from prosecution in a civil suit?

• Yes. The Court held that the President "is entitled to absolute immunity
• from damages liability predicated on his official acts." This sweeping
• immunity, argued Justice Powell, was a function of the "President's
• unique office, rooted in the constitutional tradition of separation of
• powers and supported by our history."

Facts of the Case

• Paula Corbin Jones sued President Bill Clinton.
• She alleged that while she was an Arkansas state employee, she suffered
• several "abhorrent" sexual advances from then Arkansas Governor Clinton.
• Jones claimed that her continued rejection of Clinton's advances
• ultimately resulted in punishment by her state supervisors. Following a
• District Court's grant of Clinton's request that all matters relating to
• the suit be suspended, pending a ruling on his prior request to have
• the suit dismissed on grounds of presidential immunity, Clinton sought
• to invoke his immunity to completely dismiss the Jones suit against him.
• While the District Judge denied Clinton's immunity request, the judge
• ordered the stay of any trial in the matter until after Clinton's
• Presidency. On appeal, the Eighth Circuit affirmed the dismissal denial
• but reversed the trial deferment ruling since it would be a "functional
• equivalent" to an unlawful grant of temporary presidential immunity.

Question

• Is a serving President, for separation of powers
• reasons, entitled to absolute immunity from civil litigation arising out
• of events which transpired prior to his taking office?

• No. In a unanimous opinion, the Court held that the Constitution does
• not grant a sitting President immunity from civil litigation except
• under highly unusual circumstances. After noting the great respect and
• dignity owed to the Executive office, the Court held that neither
• separation of powers nor the need for confidentiality of high-level
• information can justify an unqualified Presidential immunity from
• judicial process. While the independence of our government's branches
• must be protected under the doctrine of separation of powers, the
• Constitution does not prohibit these branches from exercising any
• control over one another. This, the Court added, is true despite the
• procedural burdens which Article III jurisdiction may impose on the
• time, attention, and resources of the Chief Executive.

Facts of the Case

• In 1920, legal action was taken against Philip
• Grossman for selling liquor at his place of business in violation of the
• National Prohibition Act. He violated a federal court injunction by
• continuing to sell alcoholic beverages. He was found guilty of criminal
• contempt of court and sentenced to one year in prison and a $1,000 fine.
• In 1923, President Calvin Coolidge issued a pardon that reduced
• Grossman's sentence to payment of the fine.

Question


Did the president have the constitutional authority to commute a sentence for criminal contempt of court?






Conclusion

• In a unanimous decision, the Court found that a
• presidential pardon for a criminal contempt of court sentence was within
• the powers of the executive. There is nothing in the words "offenses
• against the United States" that excludes criminal contempts in the
• Constitution. Actions that violate the dignity or authority of the
• federal courts violate the law of the United States, making these
• contempts offenses against the United States. The president's pardon
• authority includes such offenses. Without destroying the deterrent
• effect of judicial punishment, the president's powers are to act as
• checks against undue prejudice or needless severity in such sentencing
• by the judicial branch.

Facts of the Case

• Lincoln proclaimed a blockade of southern ports
• in April 1861. Congress authorized him to declare a state of
• insurrection by the Act of July 13, 1861. By the Act of August 6, 1861,
• Congress retroactively ratified all Lincoln's military action. These
• cases involved the seizure of vessels bound for Confederate ports prior
• to July 13, 1861.

Question


Did Lincoln act within his presidential powers defined by Article II when he ordered the seizures absent a declaration of war?






Conclusion

• Decision: 5 votes for United States, 4 vote(s) against
• Legal provision: US Const. Art 2

• The President had the power to act. A state of
• civil war existed de facto after the firing on Fort Sumter (April 12,
• 1861) and the Supreme Court would take this fact into account. Though
• neither Congress nor the President can declare war against a state of
• the Union, when states waged war against the United States government,
• the President was "bound to meet it in the shape it presented
• itself,without waiting for Congress to baptize it with a name."

Facts of the Case

• Lambden P. Milligan was sentenced to death by a
• military commission in Indiana during the Civil War; he had engaged in
• acts of disloyalty. Milligan sought release through habeas corpus from a
• federal court.

Question


Does a civil court have jurisdiction over a military tribunal?






Conclusion

• Decision: 9 votes for Milligan, 0 vote(s) against
• Legal provision: US Const. Amend 5

• Davis, speaking for the Court, held that trials
• of civilians by presidentially created military commissions are
• unconstitutional. Martial law cannot exist where the civil courts are
• operating.

Question

• Did the President exceed his authority in
• ordering a trial by military commission for the German saboteurs,
• thereby violating their rights under the Fifth and Sixth Amendments?

Conclusion

• No. In a unanimous opinion authored by Chief
• Justice Harlan Fisk Stone, the Court concluded that the conspirators, as
• spies without uniform whose purpose was sabotage, violated the law of
• war and were therefore unlawful enemy combatants. Noting that Congress
• had, under the Articles of War, authorized trial by military commission
• for unlawful enemy combatants, the Court therefore determined that the
• President had not exceeded his power. Furthermore, the Court asserted
• that the Fifth and Sixth Amendments "did not enlarge the right to jury
• trial" beyond those cases where it was understood by the framers to have
• been appropriate. Therefore, because the amendments cannot be read "as
• either abolishing all trials by military tribunals, save those of the
• personnel of our own armed forces, or, what in effect comes to the same
• thing, as imposing on all such tribunals the necessity of proceeding
• against unlawful enemy belligerents only on presentment and trial by
• jury," the rights of the conspirators were not violated.

Facts of the Case

• During World War II, Presidential Executive Order
• 9066 and congressional statutes gave the military authority to exclude
• citizens of Japanese ancestry from areas deemed critical to national
• defense and potentially vulnerable to espionage. Korematsu remained in
• San Leandro, California and violated Civilian Exclusion Order No. 34 of
• the U.S. Army.

Question

• Did the President and Congress go beyond their
• war powers by implementing exclusion and restricting the rights of
• Americans of Japanese descent?

Conclusion

• Decision: 6 votes for United States, 3 vote(s) against
• Legal provision: Executive Order 9066; U.S. Const. amend. 5

• The Court sided with the government and held that
• the need to protect against espionage outweighed Korematsu's rights.
• Justice Black argued that compulsory exclusion, though constitutionally
• suspect, is justified during circumstances of "emergency and peril."

Facts of the Case

• In April of 1952, during the Korean War,
• President Truman issued an executive order directing Secretary of
• Commerce Charles Sawyer to seize and operate most of the nation's steel
• mills. This was done in order to avert the expected effects of a strike
• by the United Steelworkers of America.

Question


Did the President have the constitutional authority to seize and operate the steel mills?






Conclusion

• Decision: 6 votes for Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co., 3 vote(s) against
• Legal provision: US Const. Art. II

• In a 6-to-3 decision, the Court held that the
• President did not have the authority to issue such an order. The Court
• found that there was no congressional statute that authorized the
• President to take possession of private property. The Court also held
• that the President's military power as Commander in Chief of the Armed
• Forces did not extend to labor disputes. The Court argued that "the
• President's power to see that the laws are faithfully executed refutes
• the idea that he is to be a lawmaker."

Facts of the Case

• In reaction to the seizure of the U.S. embassy
• and American nationals in Iran, President Jimmy Carter invoked the
• International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) and froze Iranian
• assets in the United States. When the hostages were released in 1981,
• Treasury Secretary Donald Regan affirmed the agreements made the Carter
• administration that terminated all legal proceedings against the Iranian
• government and created an independent Claims Tribunal. Dames &
• Moore attempted to recover over $3 million owed to it by the Iranian
• government and claimed the executive orders were beyond the scope of
• presidential power.

Question

• Did the president have the authority to transfer Iranian funds and to nullify legal claims against Iran?
• The Court held that the International Emergency Economic Powers Act
• constituted a specific congressional authorization for the President to
• order the transfer of Iranian assets. The Court further held that
• although the IEEPA itself did not authorize the presidential suspension
• of legal claims, previous acts of Congress had "implicitly approved" of
• executive control of claim settlement. The Court emphasized the
• narrowness of its ruling, limiting the decision to the facts of the
• case.

Facts of the Case

• Salim Ahmed Hamdan, Osama bin Laden's former
• chauffeur, was captured by Afghani forces and imprisoned by the U.S.
• military in Guantanamo Bay. He filed a petition for a writ of habeas
• corpus in federal district court to challenge his detention. Before the
• district court ruled on the petition, he received a hearing from a
• military tribunal, which designated him an enemy combatant.
• A few months later, the district court granted Hamdan's habeas
• petition, ruling that he must first be given a hearing to determine
• whether he was a prisoner of war under the Geneva Convention before he
• could be tried by a military commission. The Circuit Court of Appeals
• for the District of Columbia reversed the decision, however, finding
• that the Geneva Convention could not be enforced in federal court and
• that the establishment of military tribunals had been authorized by
• Congress and was therefore not unconstitutional.

Question

• May the rights protected by the Geneva Convention
• be enforced in federal court through habeas corpus petitions? Was the
• military commission established to try Hamdan and others for alleged war
• crimes in the War on Terror authorized by the Congress or the inherent
• powers of the President?

• Decision: 5 votes for Hamdan, 3 vote(s) against
• Legal provision: Uniform Code of Military Justice

• Yes and no. The Supreme Court, in a 5-to-3
• decision authored by Justice John Paul Stevens, held that neither an act
• of Congress nor the inherent powers of the Executive laid out in the
• Constitution expressly authorized the sort of military commission at
• issue in this case. Absent that express authorization, the commission
• had to comply with the ordinary laws of the United States and the laws
• of war. The Geneva Convention, as a part of the ordinary laws of war,
• could therefore be enforced by the Supreme Court, along with the
• statutory Uniform Code of Military Justice. Hamdan's exclusion from
• certain parts of his trial deemed classified by the military commission
• violated both of these, and the trial was therefore illegal. Justices
• Scalia, Thomas, and Alito dissented. Chief Justice John Roberts, who
• participated in the case while serving on the DC Circuit Court of
• Appeals, did not take part in the decision.

Facts of the Case

• Dred Scott was a slave in Missouri. From 1833 to
• 1843, he resided in Illinois (a free state) and in an area of the
• Louisiana Territory, where slavery was forbidden by the Missouri
• Compromise of 1820. After returning to Missouri, Scott sued
• unsuccessfully in the Missouri courts for his freedom, claiming that his
• residence in free territory made him a free man. Scott then brought a
• new suit in federal court. Scott's master maintained that no
• pure-blooded Negro of African descent and the descendant of slaves could
• be a citizen in the sense of Article III of the Constitution.

Question


Was Dred Scott free or slave?






Conclusion

• Decision: 7 votes for Sandford, 2 vote(s) against
• Legal provision: US Const. Amend. 5; Missouri Compromise

• Dred Scott was a slave. Under Articles III and
• IV, argued Taney, no one but a citizen of the United States could be a
• citizen of a state, and that only Congress could confer national
• citizenship. Taney reached the conclusion that no person descended from
• an American slave had ever been a citizen for Article III purposes. The
• Court then held the Missouri Compromise unconstitutional, hoping to end
• the slavery question once and for all.

Facts of the Case

• The Keating-Owen Child Labor Act prohibited the
• interstate shipment of goods produced by child labor. Reuben Dagenhart's
• father had sued on behalf of his freedom to allow his fourteen year old
• son to work in a textile mill.

Question


Does the congressional act violate the Commerce Clause, the Tenth Amendment, or the Fifth Amendment?






Conclusion

• Decision: 5 votes for Dagenhart, 4 vote(s) against
• Legal provision: US Const. Art 1, Section 8, Clause 3; US Const. Amend 10; Keating-Owen Act of 1916

• Day spoke for the Court majority and found two
• grounds to invalidate the law. Production was not commerce, and thus
• outside the power of Congress to regulate. And the regulation of
• production was reserved by the Tenth Amendment to the states. Day wrote
• that "the powers not expressly delegated to the national government are
• reserved" to the states and to the people. In his wording, Day revised
• the Constitution slightly and changed the intent of the framers: The
• Tenth Amendment does not say "expressly." The framers purposely left the
• word expressly out of the amendment because they believed they could
• not possibly specify every power that might be needed in the future to
• run the governme

Facts of the Case

• In 1974, Congress passed amendments to the Fair
• Labor Standards Act of 1938. The purpose of the amendments was to
• regulate minimum wage and overtime pay for state and local government
• employees. The National League of Cities, as well as several states and
• cities, challenged the constitutionality of the amendments.

Question

• May Congress, acting under its commerce power,
• regulate the labor market of state employees, which the Tenth Amendment
• reserves to the states?

• Argument
• National League of Cities v. Usery - Oral ArgumentNational League of Cities v. Usery - Opinion AnnouncementNational League of Cities v. Usery - Oral Reargument

Conclusion

• Decision: 5 votes for National League of Cities, 4 vote(s) against
• Legal provision: Article 1, Section 8, Paragraph 3: Interstate Commerce Clause

• Congress may not regulate the labor market of
• state employees. The Tenth Amendment prohibits Congress from enacting
• legislation which operates "to directly displace the States' freedom to
• structure integral operations in areas of traditional governmental
• functions." While the power of Congress under the Commerce Clause is
• "plenary," that power has constitutional limits. In this case, the
• exercise of the commerce power ran afoul of the Tenth Amendment which
• protects the states' traditional activities.