Article Three of the United States Constitution establishes the judicial branch of the U.S. federal government. Under Article Three, the judicial branch consists of the Supreme Court of the United States, as well as lower courts created by Congress. Article Three empowers the courts to handle cases or controversies arising under federal law, as well as other enumerated areas. Article Three also defines treason.
The Communications Act of 1934 is a United States federal law signed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt on June 19, 1934, and codified as Chapter 5 of Title 47 of the United States Code, 47 U.S.C. § 151 et seq. The act replaced the Federal Radio Commission with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). It also transferred regulation of interstate telephone services from the Interstate Commerce Commission to the FCC.
A.L.A. Schechter Poultry Corp. v. United States, 295 U.S. 495 (1935), was a decision by the Supreme Court of the United States that invalidated regulations of the poultry industry according to the nondelegation doctrine and as an invalid use of Congress' power under the Commerce Clause. This was a unanimous decision that rendered parts of the National Industrial Recovery Act of 1933 (NIRA), a main component of President Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal, unconstitutional. The case from which the ruling stemmed was nicknamed the "Sick Chicken Case".
The Commerce Clause describes an enumerated power listed in the United States Constitution. The clause states that the United States Congress shall have power "to regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes". Courts and commentators have tended to discuss each of these three areas of commerce as a separate power granted to Congress. It is common to see the individual components of the Commerce Clause referred to under specific terms: the Foreign Commerce Clause, the Interstate Commerce Clause, and the Indian Commerce Clause.
Panama Refining Co. v. Ryan, 293 U.S. 388 (1935), also known as the Hot Oil case, was a case, in which the United States Supreme Court ruled that the Franklin Roosevelt administration's prohibition of interstate and foreign trade in petroleum goods produced in excess of state quotas, the "hot oil" orders adopted under the 1933 National Industrial Recovery Act (NIRA), was unconstitutional.
The doctrine of nondelegation is the theory that one branch of government must not authorize another entity to exercise the power or function which it is constitutionally authorized to exercise itself. It is explicit or implicit in all written constitutions that impose a strict structural separation of powers. It is usually applied in questions of constitutionally improper delegations of powers of any of the three branches of government to either of the other, to the administrative state, or to private entities. Although it is usually constitutional for executive officials to delegate executive powers to executive branch subordinates, there can also be improper delegations of powers within an executive branch.
Separation of powers is a political doctrine originating in the writings of Charles de Secondat, Baron de Montesquieu in The Spirit of the Laws, in which he argued for a constitutional government with three separate branches, each of which would have defined abilities to check the powers of the others. This philosophy heavily influenced the drafting of the United States Constitution, according to which the Legislative, Executive, and Judicial branches of the United States government are kept distinct in order to prevent abuse of power. The American form of separation of powers is associated with a system of checks and balances.
Clinton v. City of New York, 524 U.S. 417 (1998), was a landmark decision by the Supreme Court of the United States in which the Court held, 6–3, that the line-item veto, as granted in the Line Item Veto Act of 1996, violated the Presentment Clause of the United States Constitution because it impermissibly gave the President of the United States the power to unilaterally amend or repeal parts of statutes that had been duly passed by the United States Congress. Justice John Paul Stevens wrote for the six-justice majority that the line-item veto gave the President power over legislation unintended by the Constitution, and was therefore an overstep in their duties.
The legislative veto was a feature of dozens of statutes enacted by the United States federal government between approximately 1930 and 1980, until held unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court in INS v. Chadha (1983). It is a provision whereby Congress passes a statute granting authority to the President and reserving for itself the ability to override, through simple majority vote, individual actions taken by the President pursuant to that authority.
The powers of the president of the United States include those explicitly granted by Article II of the United States Constitution as well as those granted by Acts of Congress, implied powers, and also a great deal of soft power that is attached to the presidency.
Whitman v. American Trucking Associations, Inc., 531 U.S. 457 (2001), was a case decided by the United States Supreme Court in which the Environmental Protection Agency's National Ambient Air Quality Standard (NAAQS) for regulating ozone and particulate matter was challenged by the American Trucking Association, along with other private companies and the states of Michigan, Ohio, and West Virginia.
Yakus v. United States, 321 U.S. 414 (1944), was a decision by the United States Supreme Court which upheld congressional power to fetter judicial review and to delegate broad and flexible law-making power to an administrative agency in this constitutional challenge to the Emergency Price Control Act of 1942. The wartime anti-inflation measure, intended to expedite price control enforcement, conferred on the federal district courts jurisdiction over violations of Office of Price Administration (OPA) regulations made under the act. But judicial power to consider the constitutionality of such regulations was excepted. Congress specified that challenges to their validity be initially reviewed under stringent time limitations by the OPA and on appeal exclusively by a special Article III tribunal in the District of Columbia—the Emergency Court of Appeals—and thereafter by the Supreme Court.
Carter v. Carter Coal Company, 298 U.S. 238 (1936), is a United States Supreme Court decision interpreting the Commerce Clause of the United States Constitution, which permits the United States Congress to "regulate Commerce... among the several States." Specifically, it analyzes the extent of Congress' power, according to the Commerce Clause, looking at whether or not they have the right to regulate manufacturing.
Crowell v. Benson, 285 U.S. 22 (1932) is the landmark United States Supreme Court administrative law decision that outlined the adjudicatory authority of administrative agencies under Article III of the Constitution. The Court held that the United States Employees' Compensation Commission satisfied Fifth Amendment Due Process and the requirements of Article III with its court-like procedures and because it invests the final power of decision in Article III courts.
The Natural Gas Act of 1938 was the first occurrence of the United States federal government regulating the natural gas industry. It was focused on regulating the rates charged by interstate natural gas transmission companies. In the years prior to the passage of the Act, concern arose about the monopolistic tendencies of the transmission companies and the fact that they were charging higher than competitive prices. The passage of the Act gave the Federal Power Commission (FPC) control over the regulation of interstate natural gas sales. Later on, the FPC was dissolved and became the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) pursuant to a different act. FERC continues to regulate the natural gas industry to this day.
Nixon v. General Services Administration, 433 U.S 425 (1977), is a landmark court case concerning the principle of presidential privilege and whether the public is allowed to view a President's “confidential documents”. The Presidential Recordings and Materials Preservation Act, signed into law by President Gerald Ford in 1974, ordered that the Administrator of the General Services Administration obtain President Richard Nixon’s presidential papers and tape recordings. In addition, the Act further ordered that government archivists seize these materials. These archivists would preserve the material deemed historic and return to former President Nixon the materials deemed private. Furthermore, this Act stated that material that was preserved could be used in judicial hearings and proceedings. Immediately after this Act was enacted, Richard Nixon filed a lawsuit in a federal district court claiming that the Act violated the principle of separation of powers, the principle of presidential privilege, Nixon's personal privacy, his First Amendment right of association, and further asserted that it amounted to a constitutionally prohibited Bill of Attainder.
Smith v. Kansas City Title & Trust Co., 255 U.S. 180 (1921), was a United States Supreme Court case that helped define the range and scope of federal question jurisdiction in state corporate law matters. The case dealt with whether or not a district court had the power to uphold the constitutional validity of the Federal Farm Loan Act of 1916.
The New Deal often encountered heavy criticism, and had many constitutional challenges.
Jarkesy v. Securities and Exchange Commission (2022) is a case that has been going on for almost a decade. In May 2022, Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit held, under certain statutory provisions, the Securities and Exchanges Commission's administrative adjudication of fraud claims without jury trials in their administrative proceedings with their own ALJs violated three provisions of the Constitution.
