Legislative veto

The legislative veto is a right of objection that is granted to the legislative power against individual decisions of the executive power . It is relevant in systems of government that provide for a strict separation of powers between the state organs with simultaneous mutual control .

United States

The legislative veto has been used increasingly in the United States since the 1930s. It was particularly popular with laws relating to the restructuring of administrative authorities. At that time, the President of the United States was given the power to reorganize agencies within the executive branch. However, the Congress reserved the right to overturn these decisions in individual cases by majority vote.

INS v. Chadha

In the United States , the Immigration and Naturalization Services Act of 1965 introduced a form of legislative veto. The law provided that the Immigration Service could revoke the deportation of illegally immigrated foreigners who had spent at least seven years in the country, if the Attorney General agreed to such revocation. At the same time, however, the law required the Attorney General to report such cases to Congress and that one of the two chambers of Congress could still force deportation by majority vote.

This clause was the main issue in the Immigration and Naturalization Service v. Chadha before the United States Supreme Court . The court ruled that the self-created veto is against the constitution. First, it violates the bicameral principle, which states that all legislation by the House of Representatives and the Senate must be implemented jointly and identically. Furthermore, the law violates the submission requirement, whereby legislation must be submitted to the President for approval.

Budget restrictions

In the 1985 Gramm-Rudman-Hollings Balanced Budget Act , Congress provided that the Comptroller General , head of the Government Accountability Office under Congress , had the authority to freeze items in the budget if certain deficit targets were not met. The law was designed to prevent the US budget deficit from growing any further. The Supreme Court ruled on this in 1986 in the Bowsher v. Synar , that this regulation also violates the constitution, because the Congress had in principle created an unconstitutional legislative veto.

literature

Kurt L. Shell, Andreas Falke : Chapter Politics, Section “The President as Legislator”. In: Peter Lösche (Ed.): Country Report USA. History, politics, economy, society, culture. 5. new. Edition. Federal Agency for Civic Education , Bonn 2008, ISBN 978-3-89331-851-3 , pp. 123–126

Remarks

↑ FindLaw: US Constitution: Article I: Annotations pg. 25 of 58: Retrieved January 28, 2008 .

[1] FindLaw: US Constitution: Article I: Annotations pg. 25 of 58: Retrieved January 28, 2008 .