And Truman'sĪrgument might have been hey, look the constitution No civilian authority to seize the steel mill, so he had no independent authority to rely on them in the zone of twilight, and therefore, the court held Not authorized the seizure and the president had The Steel Seizure case, although the congress had It sounds like the Twilight Zone and I always think of And when congress has neitherĪpproved or disapproved, the president acts in a zone of twilight, as Justice Jackson said. When he acts in the face ofĬongressional disapproval, his authority as at its lowest ebb. Basically, when the president acts with congressional approval, his authority is at its height. Identified three categories of executive power thatĮvery law student learns and they're easy to remember. Go check it out on the web because it's so important. In the steel seizure case is the concurring opinionīy Justice Robert Jackson, and I want our listeners to

Truman is shocked, he'sĪppointed many of the justices but the most influential opinion He decides on his own withoutĬongressional authorization to seize the steel millsĪs part of his authority, his military authorityĪs commander-in-chief and this goes up to the supreme court and the supreme court strikes him down. What was the context there? Why did this need to be ruled on? - Well, it's an amazing case and the steel companiesĪre gonna go on strike, and President Truman decides this is a threat to national security because the army needs steel And the Steel SeizureĬase that you talked about, this was in 1952, this was arguably talkingĪbout the Korean War. When congress is silent, and how much congressĬan constrain its power has led rise to some hugeĬonstitutional controversies. Once the war starts but how the president canĪct to deploy the troops in the face of emergencies There's civilian control of the military, there's a single leader Has the power to declare war and once war is declared, the president has total control over the conduct of the war. These cryptic words of theĬommander-in-chief clause have given rise to some of the most persistent controversies in How do these two thingsįit together, Jeffrey? - Well, they've led to the most dramatic constitutionalĬontroversies in American history as Justice Robert Jackson put Of stuffs, a bunch of things but one of the things that it list is the power to declare war, grant letters of marque and reprisal and make rules concerningĬaptures on land and water. And this seems like there'sĪ bit of a balance here because in Article I which describes the powers of the congress in section eight, it says the congress shall have power and it starts listing a bunch And now we're gonna focus a little bit on the first part of section two which talks about among other things that the President shallīe the Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, essentially the military So, I'm here with Jeffrey Rosen head of the National ConstitutionĬenter in Philadelphia and we're continuing to talk about Article II of the US Constitution which talks about the

President as commander in chief