Constitutional Law Flashcards
Judicial Power: Source, Scope, and Limitations
Article III
The jurisdiction of the federal courts is limited to cases or controversies
Limitations: The Eleventh Amendment and State Sovereign Immunity
Eleventh Amendment and State Sovereign Immunity
You cannot sue a state for money damages in either state or federal court unless:
- the state consents; or
- the US Congress expressly say so to enforce Fourteenth Amendment rights
Who can you sue then?
A state officer
- Can always get injunctive relief simply by enjoining the appropriate state officer
- Can also get money damages, but only from the officer personally
Original Jurisdiction
A case may be filed first in Supreme Court (controversies between states, mostly)
Certiorari
Most cases that go to Supreme Court
Discretionary with the court
Supreme Court is the only federal court that exercises discretionary jurisdiction
Limitations on the Supreme Court’s Appellate Jurisdiction
Congress can make exceptions to the Court’s appellate jurisdiciton
Adequate and Independent State Grounds
The Supreme Court can review a state court judgment ONLY if it turned on federal grounds. The court has no jurisdiction if the judgment below rested on an adequate and independent state ground.
Adequate: state ground must control the decision no matter how a federal issue is decided
Independent: The state law des not depend on an interpretation of federal law.
Standing to Sue
Standing requires injury, causation, and redressability
Standing: Injury
Can be almost anything past or future
Must be concrete, but need not be economic
Mere ideological objection is not injury
Standing: Redressability
A court can remedy or redress the injury
If the injury is in the past, the redress is damages
If future injury is threatened, the redress is an injunction
*Past injury does not give automatic standing to seek an injunction for future injury. Must show that it will happen again
Taxpayer Standing
Federal taxpayers ALWAYS have standing to challenge their own tax liability
Taxpayers do not have standing to challenge government expenditures
- EXCEPTION: under the Establishment Clause, an establishment of religion challenge to specific congressional appropriations can be challenged by any taxpayer
Legislative Standing
Legislators do not have standing to challenge laws that they voted against
“Third-Party Standing”
Refers to the question of whether you can raise the rights of someone else
Generally, no
EXCEPTION: parties to an exchange or transaction can raise the rights of other parties to that exchange or transaction
Ripeness
Concerns prematurity of a case. Must show actual harm or an immediate threat of harm
Mootness
Cases that are overripe and are dismissed whenever they become moot
Exception: Controversies capable of repetition, yet evading review
Advisory Opinions
Federal courts cannot issue advisory opinions
- Cannot rule on the constitutionality of proposed legislation
Political Questions
A non-justiciable question - courts will not decide because there ware no manageable standards for judicial decision-making
Examples:
- Guarantee Clause (protecting the republican form of government);
- Foreign affairs
- Impeachment procedures
- Political gerrymandering
Legislative Power: Three Wrong Answers
- Promoting the general welfare is not a power of Congress
- The federal government does not have a general police power
- Necessary and Proper is not a free-standing power of Congress. It works only as an add-on to some other legislative power
The Commerce Power
Almost anything can be regulated as interstate commerce.
Congress can regulate:
- The channels of interstate commerce;
- The instrumentalities of interstate commerce; and
- Intrastate and interstate activity (economic or commercial) that has a substantial effect on interstate commerce.
(substantial effect judged in the aggregate)
The Taxing Power
The Taxing Clause is the right answer whenever Congress imposes a tax, even when the tax is actually used to prohibit the good or activity in question
The tax must be rationally related to raising revenue
The Spending Power
Includes spending for the general welfare
Congress can use the Spending Power to accomplish things it could not do by direct regulation under the Commerce Clause
Anti-Commandeering
Congress cannot force states to adopt or enforce regulatory programs.
It cannot commandeer state and local officers to carry out federal programs
What can Congress do to enforce regulatory programs?
It can bribe states through use of the spending power
It can adopt its own regulatory program and enforce it with federal officers
The war and Defense Powers
Congress has the power to
- declare war and the power to maintain the Army and Navy
- provide for military discipline of the United Staes armed forces Members
Can provide for military trial of enemy combatants and enemy civilians
Cannot provide for military trial of U.S. civilians
Thirteenth Amendment
Congress has broad power to legislate against racial discrimination, whether public or private
(includes purely private racial discrimination)
Fourteenth Amendment
Congress has the power to remedy violations of individual rights by the government, but only as those rights have been defined by the courts (does not enable Congress to redefine constitutional rights by legislation)
To be properly remedial, the legislation must have “congruence” and “proportionality” - there must be a reasonable fit between the remedial law enacted by Congress and the constitutional right as declared by the Supreme Court
Congress does not have the power to overrule the Court’s decisions and define new rights
Fifteenth Amendment
Congress has the power to ensure no racial discrimination in voting
Domestic Powers of the President
- Enforce the law (greatest when authorized by statute)
Exclusively executive powers:
- Pardon power
- Veto Power
- Appointment and Removal of Executive Officers
Pardon Power
The President can pardon or commute punishment for all federal offenses
Veto Power
The President has 10 days to veto legislation.
- can veto for any or no reason, but cannot veto specific items in the legislation and accept others
Overriding a veto requires a 2/3 majority vote of each house
Appointment and Removal of Executive Officers
Only the President (or his appointees) can hire or fire executive officers.
Some senior officers require the advice and consent of the Senate.
The senate has power of rejection. The Senate’s approval Power does not translate into a power of appointment
Who are executive officers?
Anyone who takes action on behalf of the U.S.
Foreign Affairs Powers of the President
- Commander in Chief
- Treatises and Executive Agreements
Commander in Chief
The president has control over military decisions, although Congress has exclusive power to declare war
Treatises
Negotiated by the President, but require approval by a 2/3 vote of the Senate.
Once a treaty is ratified, it has the same authority as a statute
Executive Agreements
Presidential negotiations not submitted for approval by the Senate
Can be authorized, precluded, or overridden by statute, but they take precedence over conflicting state laws. They do not have the binding status of a treaty.
Congressional Limits on the Executive
- Impeachment
- Impoundment
- Legislative Veto
Impeachment
Applies to executive officers.
An accusation of high crimes or misdemeanors requiring a majority vote of the House of Representatives
- Trial in the Senate
- Conviction requires 2/3 vote of the Senate
- the remedy is removal from office, no other penalty applies
Impoundment
If a statute gives the president discretion to spend or withhold funds, he may do so.
But, when a statute unambiguously requires that funds be spend, the President cannot refuse to do so. There is no power to impound funds.
Legislative Veto
Unconstitutional
Happens when Congress passes a law reserving to itself the right to disapprove future executive actions by simple resolution
- If Congress wants to override future executive actions, it must change the law
- Congress cannot evade the President’s guaranteed veto opportunity by passing a law saying that in the future it plans to govern by resolution
Delegation of Powers
congress can delegate its power to administrative agencies, so long as there are intelligible standard governing the exercise of that delegated power
Presidential Immunity
- Absolute immunity for official acts
- NO immunity for acts done prior to taking office
- Executive privilege not to reveal confidential communications with presidential advisers, but that privilege can be outweighed by a specifically demonstrated need in criminal prosecution
Judicial Immunity
Judges have absolute immunity for all judicial acts, but may be liable for non-judicial activities
Legislative Immunity
United States Senators and Representatives (not state legislators) are protected by the Speech or Debate Clause
- Senators and Congressmen and their aides cannot be prosecuted or punished in relation to their official acts
Federal and State Powers
Even though federal powers are superior, most federal powers are concurrent with those of the states
Some powers are exclusively federal
- power over foreign relations
- power to coin money
Intergovernmental Immunities
The federal government is generally immune from direct state regulation or taxation
- States can tax indirectly, such as taxing the income of federal employees
States are not immune from direct federal regulation
- State laws cannot shield state officers from federal liability
Exception: anti-commandeering
Privileges and Immunities of State Citizenship under Article IV (Comity Clause)
Forbids serious discrimination against out-of-state individuals
- does not protect out-of-state corporations
- “serious discrimination” typically involves employment
Rule: There can be no legal requirement of residency for private employment. States cannot require that you live/reside in the state to work in the state (however, public employment can require residency requirements)
Dormant Commerce Clause
In the absence of federal regulation, state regulation of commerce is VALID so long as:
1) There is no discrimination against out-of-state interests;
2) The regulation does not unduly burden interstate commerce; and
3) The regulation does not apply to wholly extraterritorial activity
Exceptions to No State Discrimination Against Out-of-State Interests
- State as Market Participant
- Subsidies
- Federal Approval
State as Market Participant
When a state is buying or selling goods or services, it can choose to deal with only in-state persons
Subsidies
Exception to No State Discrimination Against Out-of-State Interests
A state can always choose to subsidize only its own citizens
Federal Approval of Discrimination Against Out-of-State Interests
The Dormant Commerce Clause applies only in the absence of federal action.
If Congress authorizes or consents to state regulation of commerce, nothing the state does will violate the Commerce Clause, even if it discriminates against out-of-state interests
State Taxation of Interstate Commerce
Discriminatory taxation: will be struck down unless Congress consents
Nondiscriminatory taxation is valid if:
1) substantial nexus between the taxing state and the property or activity to be taxed
2) Must be a fair apportionment of tax liability among states
Ad Valorem Property Taxes
Levied on Personal Property
Commodities: goods that move from state to state
- The full tax is paid to every state where the goods are stopped for a business purpose on tax day
- No taxes due when they are merely passing through
Instrumentalities: the transportation equipment that moves commodities
- each state in which an instrumentality is used can tax the value of that instrumentality
Preemption
Federal law preempts inconsistent state law
State law is not preempted simply because it addresses the same subject matter/topic as a federal statute. There must be incompatibility or conflict
Preempting the Field
When Congress determines that there should be no state law of any sort in a particular field, then any state law in that area is inconsistent with the federal statute and is preempted.
