# INS v. Chadha **462 U.S. 919 (June 23, 1983).** The Supreme Court held 7–2 that the **legislative veto** violates the Constitution. A legislative veto was a statutory provision letting one chamber, or both, nullify an executive action without presenting the measure to the President. The Court held that it breaches the bicameralism and presentment requirements of Article I, § 7. Chief Justice [[Warren Burger]] wrote for the Court, [[Lewis Powell]] concurred in the judgment, and [[Byron White]] and [[William Rehnquist]] dissented. White's dissent noted that the ruling struck down provisions in nearly 200 statutes at once, more federal law than the Court had invalidated in its entire history. ## It began as a deportation case Jagdish Rai Chadha was a Kenyan-born man of Indian descent, holding a British passport, who had overstayed a student visa. An immigration judge suspended his deportation in 1974 on hardship grounds. The Immigration and Nationality Act let either chamber overturn such a suspension by simple resolution. In December 1975 the House, on a resolution from Rep. Joshua Eilberg, overturned Chadha's suspension along with five others, with no hearing, no report and no recorded vote. The structural case that remade separation-of-powers law came from a single deportation reversed on the House floor. ## What the ruling actually did Through the 1970s Congress had written legislative vetoes into the statutes that delegated authority to the executive, on the theory that a delegation it could reverse was a safe one to make. *Chadha* **removed the reversal mechanism and left every delegation intact.** The executive kept the power Congress had handed over. Congress lost the cheap way to take it back. After 1983 every reversal has to be an ordinary law: passed by both chambers, presented to the President and exposed to the veto. A President who wants to keep a delegated power needs only one-third plus one of either chamber to sustain a veto. ## The substitutes Congress built - **Joint resolutions in place of concurrent ones.** The [[National Emergencies Act]] originally let Congress end an emergency by [[Concurrent Resolution]], with no presidential signature. In 1985 Congress switched to a [[Joint Resolution]], which the President can veto. Terminating an emergency the President wants to keep now effectively takes two-thirds of both chambers ([[Emergency Powers Crosswalk]]). The [[War Powers Resolution]] got an expedited joint-resolution track the same way. - **Fast-track disapproval.** The [[Congressional Review Act]] (1996) is the post-*Chadha* legislative veto rebuilt to survive *Chadha*. It uses a joint resolution with expedited, filibuster-proof procedures. It works only when the President agrees with Congress, which in practice means only against the previous administration's rules. - **Report-and-wait.** Statutes that make an agency notify Congress and wait before acting survive, because they give Congress time to pass a law, not a veto. - **The informal veto.** Committees still write "legislative veto" clauses into appropriations reports. Agencies usually honor them, not because the clauses bind but because the same committees write next year's budget. ## Why it matters now The vault's emergency-powers work treats *Chadha* as a **termination** case more than an administrative-law case. Its lasting effect is an asymmetry. Entering an emergency takes one signature. Leaving one, against the President's wishes, takes a supermajority. The asymmetry keeps turning up in unexpected places. [[National Mining Association v. Zinke]] struck the concurrent-resolution disapproval in FLPMA § 204(c) on *Chadha* grounds and left the Interior Secretary's withdrawal power standing ([[Federal Land Management Crosswalk]]). The pattern is the same each time: the notice to Congress survives and the veto does not. ## See also - [[Legislative Veto]] · [[Concurrent Resolution]] · [[Joint Resolution]] - [[National Emergencies Act]] · [[War Powers Resolution]] · [[Emergency Powers Crosswalk]] - [[Congressional Review Act]] · [[Nondelegation Doctrine]] · [[Separation of Powers]] - [[Learning Resources v. Trump]] · [[Youngstown Sheet and Tube Co. v. Sawyer]]