THE LINE ITEM VETO ACT – DOES IT REALLY CROSS THE LINE?

I. Introduction In 1996, Congress and the President passed the Line Item Veto Act, purporting to give the President some sort of line-item veto authority over certain spending items. Less than two years later, however, the United States Supreme Court in Clinton v. City of New York struck down the Line Item Veto Act for violating the Presentment Clause of the United States Constitution. The Court focused on the textual language of the Presentment Clause and failed to discuss the broader separation of powers issue. Many have critiqued the Court’s narrow invalidation and avoidance of discussing separation of powers. This note criticizes the Court’s approach in Clinton v. City of New York and argues that the Court should have addressed the more important issue of separation of powers. In doing so, however, this note will argue that there was not even violation of the Presentment Clause like the Majority had decided. In analyzing the Line Item Veto Act under separation of powers, this note argues for a functionalist approach, recognizing the need for a workable government, as opposed to the more textual, narrow formalist approach. Because the Line Item Veto Act did not violate separation of powers or threaten our tri-partite system of government, the Court should not have struck down the Act as an unconstitutional delegation but should have instead upheld the Act as a sound policy decision of both Congress and the President.
II. The Line Item Veto Act
In 1996, the Line Item Veto Act was signed into law. With the purpose of promoting savings, ensuring fiscal accountability, eliminating wasteful federal spending, and eliminating certain special tax breaks, the Act gave the President the authority to cancel three types of provisions that had been signed into law: “(1) any dollar amount of discretionary