SUPREME COURT ON POLITICAL QUESTIONS AND SEPARATION OF POWERS
This essay analyzes the decisions of the Supreme Court in the area of political questions and the separation of powers among the executive, legislative and judicial branches of government, as illustrated by selected cases, and examines critically related propositions. Issues of constitutional (and statutory) interpretation must be and have been dealt with by the Court in cases involving political questions. Likewise, practical issues should be but have not always been considered on a consistent basis by the Court in some separation of power cases. The Court has thereby contributed to an erosion of its own moral authority.
Diminished Scope of the Political Question Doctrine
In the broad sense of the term, all decisions by the Court on the allocation and separation of powers among the different branches of government are political in the sense that they address the distribution of political power in the American system of government. Traditionally, the Court has shown a reluctance to intervene in certain areas, such as the conduct by the executive of foreign policy. It has also until recently refrained from intervening in the electoral process on the grounds that to do so would enmesh the federal courts in essentially political questions best left to the electorate and their representatives, the Congress.
In Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer, 343 U.S. 579 (1952), the Court by a six to three majority held that President Truman's seizure of steel mills during a steel strike was unconstitutional because his action exceeded his powers and invaded the legislative prerogatives of the Congress. Justice Black for the majority said that "the President's power to see that the laws are faithfully executed refutes the idea that he is a law maker." He pointed out that legislative power is vested in the Congress under Art. I, Sec. 1. A close reading of that opinion reveals...