Clinton V City of New York

Title and Year

Clinton V City of New York

1998

Court

'  Rehnquist

Majority Opinion

John Paul Stevens

Facts/Brief Background

The line item veto act gave the president the right to veto any part of the bill which was given to him for approval. He is also allowed to prevent the use of funds for the vetoed provisions and to use those funds to equalize the deficit funding in other areas. This act created political controversy as soon as the act was passed. Many attempts were taken by member of the house of representatives to file law suits but everything ended in vain. New York and District of Columbia will gain benefits from the Balanced Budget Act of 1997 which gave preference to both the states under the Medicaid law. Snake River Potato Growers Inc a potato processing co-operative will gain benefits from the Taxpayer Relief Act of 1997 which allowed tax-free sale of stock one co-operative to another. Both the provisions that would be produce benefits for the state and the company were vetoed by Clinton using the Line Item Veto act. District of Columbia and City of New York filed a law suit against the President Clinton along with many other healthcare companies arguing that Clinton’s veto using the Line Item Veto Act was unconstitutional. The district court ruled in favor of the States claiming that act was unconstitutional. The case was directly appealed in the supreme court.

Issue

Under constitutional law, is a President's use of a line-item veto, codified through Congressional legislation, viable as a proper law, when the President has authority to cancel items which gave a state preferential treatment, and also canceled a limited tax benefit? Ruling & Legal Doctrine

The Court ruled in favor of the states claiming that the act violated the presentment clause of the Article 1 Section 7 which puts forth the procedure in which a bill becomes a law. More over by using the Line Item Veto the president is not only rejecting some sections of the bills and what he is actually doing is amending the bill. Amendments to the bill are the powers granted to the Senate and the House of Representatives and not to the president by the Article 1 Section 7. Thus he is violating the “Finely wrought” procedures proposed in Article 1 Section 7 of the constitution. Moreover, Article 1 Section 7 gives the power to the President to veto the Bills completely and the constitution doesn’t give him the power to selectively veto the provisions of the bill. The court also ruled that in order to give more/less power to the president, Congress doesn’t have the power to pass a legislation to increase/decrease the powers. That can be done only with the help of adding an amendment to the constitution. Thus the Line Item Veto act is held unconstitutional.

Significance

The Supreme court using this precedent said that a legislative veto is unconstitutional in the case INS V Chadha. The line item veto matters is not over. Many Presidents have started to pass amendments and legislations through the congress in order to get the power. But that would be always unconstitutional until an amendment is added to the constitution giving president more power than before. Also signifys importance of Nardos and the Arayas.