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Impoundment

  • During 1970s, Nixon claimed the authority under article II powers to impound funds previously authorized by Congress.

  • Congress responded by passing Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974 governing two kinds of impoundment.

  • Deferrals of budget authority were permissible only to provide for contingencies, achieve savings made possible by changes in requirements or greater efficiency in operations, or as specifically provided by law.

  • Rescission of budget authority (decision that all or part of any budget authority will not be required to carry out full objectives/scope of programs) – proposal to rescind will not take effect unless within 45 days after notification, Congress has enacted a rescission bill rescinding all or part of the amount proposed to be rescinded.

  • Impoundment Control Act of 1974 has little legal effect.

  • Regarding rescissions, Congress did not need prior legislation to allow it to pass bill mandating expenditure of funds.

  • Regarding deferral, either Nixon was constitutionally right or wrong to assert deferral authority. If Nixon was right, it was unconstitutional for Congress to invade president’s authority with legislation. If Nixon was wrong, legislation was unnecessary.

  • If Act has little legal effect, why has it been successful in resolving the problem?

Line item vetoes

  • For many years, Presidents have sought from Congress the authority to veto specific spending provisions (a specific “line item”) included within comprehensive legislative appropriations.

  • Argument that line-item legislation would not have legal consequences.

  • If Congress wanted to subject individual appropriations to a veto, it could do so by passing each appropriations measure as a separate bill.

  • If Congress wanted to shield individual appropriations from a line-item veto, it could do so by pro tanto repealing the president’s rescission authority as part of the very bill the president wishes to veto.

  • If line item veto did have legal consequences, is it constitutional for Congress to rewrite the veto procedure outlined in Article I? Would the rescission authority granted to president be sufficiently constrained to avoid a non delegation doctrine attack?

Unfunded mandates

  • Federal legislation imposing costly requirements on the states without providing funds to pay for them.

New York V. United States – No unfunded mandates – 10th Amendment

  • 1992. SCt held that when unfunded mandates were directed solely to the states and were not part of generally applicable laws, they might under some circumstances violate 10th Amendment.

Unfunded Mandate Reform Act of 1995.

  • Purports to further limit power of federal government to impose unfunded mandates. Bills imposing more than $50M/year mandate on state governments are subject to a point of order.

  • Does this Act have any legal effect, in light of the fact that either House could overrule a point of order?

  • Is the role assigned to the Director of the Congressional Budget Office constitutional after Bowsher?