William J. Clinton, President of the United States, et al. v. City of New York, et al. (524 U.S. 417)
U.S. Supreme Court · decided June 25, 1998 · Supreme Court Database (Spaeth)
- Citation
- 524 U.S. 417 · 118 S. Ct. 2091
- Decided
- June 25, 1998
- Term
- October Term 1997
- Vote
- 6–3
- Majority author
- Justice Stevens
- Issue area
- Miscellaneous
- Disposition
- Affirmed
- Outcome
- Petitioning party lost
- Ideological direction
- Unspecifiable
- Constitutional ruling
- Federal law held unconstitutional
Opinion excerpt
Justice Stevens delivered the opinion of the Court. The Line Item Veto' Act (Act), 110 Stat. 1200, 2 U. S. C. § 691 et seq. (1994 ed., Supp. II), was enacted in April 1996 and became effective on January 1,1997. The following day, six Members of Congress who had voted against the Act brought suit in the District Court for the District of Columbia challenging its constitutionality. On April 10, 1997, the District Court entered an order holding that the Act is unconstitutional. Byrd v. Raines, 956 F. Supp. 25. In obedience to the statutory direction to allow a direct, expedited appeal to this Court, see §§692(b)-(e), we promptly noted probable jurisdiction and expedited review, 520 U. S. 1194 (1997). We determined, however, that the Members of Congress did not have standing to sue because they had not “alleged a sufficiently concrete injury to have established Article III standing,” Raines v. Byrd, 521 U. S. 811, 830 (1997); thus, “[i]n ... light of [the] overriding and time-honored concern about keeping the Judiciary’s power within its proper constitutional sphere,” id., at 820, we remanded the case to the District Court with instructions to dismiss the complaint for lack of jurisdiction. Less than two months after our decision in that case, the President exercised his authority to cancel one provision in the Balanced Budget Act of 1997, Pub. L. 105-38, 111 Stat. 251, 515, and…
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