Field v. Clark
Reference: 143 U.S. 649 (1892)
Term: 1891
Important Dates
Argued: November 30, December 1-2, 1891 Decided: February 29, 1892
Outcome
United States Circuit Court for the Northern District of Illinois affirmed
Majority
John Harlan I •Stephen Johnson Field •Horace Gray •Samuel Blatchford •David Josiah Brewer •Henry Billings Brown •George Shiras
Concurring
Lucius Quintus Cincinnatus Lamar •Melville Fuller
Dissenting
None

Field v. Clark is a case decided on February 29, 1892, by theUnited States Supreme Court concerning the constitutionality of a congressional delegation of authority to the President as part of the Tariff Act of 1890, commonly known as the Mckinley Tariff.^[1] Several import businesses, including Marshall Field & Co., the defendant, argued that the tariff represented anunconstitutional delegation of legislative power to the President. The Supreme Court ruled unanimously that the tariff was constitutional, since it only delegated discretionary power to the President.^[2]

Why it matters:The decision provided an earlier precursor to theintelligible principle test established later inJ.W. Hampton Jr. & Company v. United States (1928).

Background

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TheJudiciary Act of 1891, which was passed one year before the ruling inField v. Clark, established nine United States Circuit Courts of Appeals. Previously, the federal court system had used the basic structure set by theJudiciary Act of 1789, with one or more District Courts in each state, along with Circuit Courts that moved around the state throughout the year (hence the name "circuit"). Prior to 1891, the Supreme Court had acted as a court of appeals for all federal courts and its justices had been required to spend a certain amount of time per year traveling a circuit. Following the Judiciary Act of 1891, appeals from District and Circuit Courts went to the Circuit Courts of Appeals, then could advance to the Supreme Court, though some types of cases could advance to the Supreme Court directly. Constitutional cases were one such type, soField v. Clark advanced directly from theUnited States Circuit Court for the Northern District of Illinois to the Supreme Court. The act also eliminated the traveling requirement for Supreme Court justices. Twenty years later, theJudicial Code of 1911 eliminated the Circuit Courts and transferred most of their responsibilities to the District Courts.

The Tariff Act of 1890, often called the McKinley Tariff after its sponsorWilliam McKinley, altered the tariffs on a wide range of imported goods. It also gave the President the power to suspend the tariff rates set by the act if another country altered its tariffs in a way that he felt was harmful to U.S. industry and trade. Several import businesses, including Marshall Field & Co., the defendant in this case, challenged the validity of the tariff. In each case, the United States Circuit Courts sided with the government and found the tariff to be valid. Field & Co. appealed the case, and since it dealt with the constitutionality of the tariff, it advanced to the Supreme Court.^[1]

Oral argument

Oral arguments were held on November 30 and December 1 & 2, 1891. The case was decided on February 29, 1892.^[3]

Outcome

The Supreme Court ruled unanimously that the Tariff Act of 1890 was constitutional, since it only delegated to the President the power of discretion, not the power of legislation.

JusticeJohn Harlan I wrote the majority opinion and was joined by JusticesStephen Johnson Field,Horace Gray,Samuel Blatchford,David Josiah Brewer,Henry Billings Brown, andGeorge Shiras.

JusticeLucius Quintus Cincinnatus Lamar dissented from the opinion but concurred in the judgment, and was joined by Chief JusticeMelville Fuller.

Opinions

Opinion of the court

Writing for the court, JusticeJohn Harlan I identified three grounds upon which the plaintiffs challenged the Tariff Act. They first alleged that the act had not been passed according to the proper legislative procedures, since the final version had differed from the version signed by the President and presiding congressional officers. They pointed to discrepancies in the House and Senate journals as evidence for this claim. Justice Harlan drew on several earlier precedents to argue that these journals did not constitute the "highest evidence of the facts," and so a law that been passed could not "be overcome by what the journal of either house shows or fails to show."^[2]

The plaintiffs next argued that Section 3 of the act, which had given the President power to suspend the tariff rates set by the act if he felt that certain countries had enacted tariffs harmful to the United States, was anunconstitutional delegation of Congress' legislative power. In response, Harlan quoted a series of earlier tariff acts which had given similar discretion to the President. He also noted that Congress had "prescribed, in advance, the duties to be levied, collected, and paid" and that the President's power related only to the enforcement of the act. The President was thus "the mere agent of the law-making department," so the act was constitutional.

Finally, the plaintiffs contended that the section of the act that prescribed subsidies to be paid by Congress to domestic sugar producers was unconstitutional, since Congress had no power to appropriate such funds. They argued that the Court should invalidate this section, which would thus invalidate the entire act. Justice Harlan held that even if this section were found to be invalid, it would not be necessary to strike down the other sections of the act.

The Supreme Court held the Tariff Act of 1890 to be constitutional, affirming the judgments of the lower courts.

Concurring opinions

JusticeLucius Quintus Cincinnatus Lamar dissented from the opinion but concurred in the judgment, and was joined by Chief JusticeMelville Fuller. The two disagreed with the majority and felt that Section 3, which gave the President discretion to suspend the tariff, did involve an unconstitutional delegation of Congress' legislative and treaty-making powers. They also contended that the earlier acts cited by Justice Harlan had been fundamentally different from the act in question. Though they felt Section 3 was unconstitutional, they concluded that this did not invalidate the other sections of the act.

Dissenting opinions

There were no dissenting opinions.

Impact

Though it does not mention the decision by name,Field v. Clark upheld the logic presented earlier by Chief JusticeJohn Marshall inWayman v. Southard (1825), that Congress could delegate its non-legislative powers to other branches of the federal government. In his majority opinion in that case, Marshall held the following:

In that opinion, Marshall also made an early reference to thenondelegation doctrine, which holds thatArticle I of the US Constitution assigned all legislative powers to the Congress and these cannot be delegated to any other branch. The ruling inWayman v. Southard affirmed the right of Congress to delegate its subordinate duties, such as fact-finding, promulgation of specific regulations, and enforcement to other government entities, which paved the way for the rise of theadministrative state.

About 100 years afterWayman v. Southard, the ruling inJ.W. Hampton Jr. & Company v. United States (1928) established theintelligible principle test for determining whether Congress had violated the nondelegation doctrine. Chief JusticeWilliam Howard Taft wrote the following:

In that opinion, Taft explicitly drew on the argument fromField v. Clark that the specific guidance Congress had provided the President in the Tariff Act of 1890 were sufficient to keep his actions within the bounds of discretionary power, and thus within the boundaries of delegated power.^[6] Theintelligible principle test has been used in every case involving thenondelegation doctrine of power since 1928 (SeeA.L.A. Schechter Poultry Corp. v. United States,Mistretta v. United States, andWhitman v. American Trucking Associations for examples).

See also

• Nondelegation doctrine
• Article I, United States Constitution
• Wayman v. Southard
• J.W. Hampton Jr. & Company v. United States
• A.L.A. Schechter Poultry Corp. v. United States
• Mistretta v. United States
• Whitman v. American Trucking Associations
• Separation of powers
• Rulemaking
• Administrative law
• Supreme Court of the United States
• History of the Supreme Court

External links

• Full Text of the Case via Justia
• Supreme Court of the United States
• Search Google News for this topic

Footnotes

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Gardner •A.L.A. Schechter Poultry Corp. v. United States •Association of Data Processing Service Organizations v. Camp •Auer v. Robbins •Chevron v. Natural Resources Defense Council •Citizens to Preserve Overton Park v. Volpe •Federal Trade Commission (FTC) v. Standard Oil Company of California •Field v. Clark •Food and Drug Administration v. Brown and Williamson Tobacco Corporation •Humphrey's Executor v. United States •Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) v. Chadha •J.W. Hampton Jr. & Company v. United States •Lucia v. SEC •Marshall v. Barlow's •Massachusetts v. Environmental Protection Agency •Mistretta v. United States •National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB) v. Sebelius •National Labor Relations Board v. Noel Canning Company •National Labor Relations Board v. Sears, Roebuck & Co. •Panama Refining Co. v. Ryan •Securities and Exchange Commission v. Chenery Corporation •Skidmore v. Swift & Co. •United States v. Lopez •United States v. Western Pacific Railroad Co. •Universal Camera Corporation v. National Labor Relations Board •Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Corp. v. Natural Resources Defense Council •Wayman v. Southard •Weyerhaeuser Company v. United States Fish and Wildlife Service •Whitman v. American Trucking Associations •Wickard v. Filburn •Wiener v. 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Dresch (2000) "Confronting the Administrative Threat" by Philip Hamburger and Tony Mills (2017) "Constitutionalism after the New Deal" by Cass R. Sunstein (1987) Federalist No. 23 by Alexander Hamilton (1787) "From Administrative State to Constitutional Government" by Joseph Postell (2012) "Interring the Nondelegation Doctrine" by Eric A. Posner and Adrian Vermeule (2002) "Rulemaking as Legislating" by Kathryn Watts (2015) "The Checks & Balances of the Regulatory State" by Paul R. Verkuil (2016) "The Myth of the Nondelegation Doctrine" by Keith E. Whittington and Jason Iuliano (2017) "The Progressive Origins of the Administrative State: Wilson, Goodnow, and Landis" by Ronald J. Pestritto (2007) "The Rise and Rise of the Administrative State" by Gary Lawson (1994) "The Study of Administration" by Woodrow Wilson (1887) "The Threat to Liberty" by Steven F. Hayward (2017) "Why the Modern Administrative State Is Inconsistent with the Rule of Law" by Richard A. Epstein (2008) Agencies Administrative Conference of the United States •United States Civil Service Commission •U.S. Government Accountability Office •U.S. Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs •U.S. Office of Management and Budget