Congress rebuff, judicial victory for Reagan

Press, 25 June 1983, Page 11

Congress rebuff, judicial victory for Reagan

NZPA j Washington Defying President Ronald Reagan twice in one day, the Demodratic-controlled House of Representatives and the Republican-led Senate approved a compromise JUSBS9 billion Government Budget plan' that calls for more domestic measures and heavily slashes the increases that he sought in military spending. The House approved the Budget 239-186, the Senate 51-43. Earlier ■ yesterday the House voted 229-191 to limit this year’s income tax cut to SUS72O a couple, a move that Mr Reagan has promised again and again to veto. The debate and votes on both sides of Capitol Hill provided more of a preview of the 1984 Presidential campaign than any likely real change in the size of the Federal Budget of each voter’s Federal tax bill. The tax bill was sure to be defeated in the Senate, where it was expected to reach the floor on Wednesday. Mr Reagan has threatened to veto any tax or spending measures which breach his economic programme, even though they might be required under the Budget blueprint. Specifically, the Budget plan calls for SUS 73 billion in tax increases over three years, at least SUSIS billion more in domestic programmes than Mr Reagan wants, and half the 10 per cent military increase — after inflation — that he says is vital for national security. The compromise would produce a ?USI79 billion dollar Budget deficit in fiscal 1984, beginning on October 1, compared with the

SUSI7I billion deficit in Mr Reagan’s original Budget proposals. In the Republican-domin-ated Senate opponents apparently had the votes to defeat the tax-cut curtailment. Mr Reagan will not have a chance to veto the Budget resolution, which merely serves as a guideline for later tax and spending decisions by Congress, but the appropriations and tax measures approved under the ceilings set by the Budget blueprint must go to the White House for Mr Reagan’s signature before they become law. © In a victory for the White House, the United States Supreme Court ruled yesterday that Congress cannot veto decisions of the President and the Executive branch made under powers granted to them by the legislature. The opinion, one of the most important made by the Court on the separation of powers under the United States Constitution, affects some 200 laws ranging from national security and foreign affairs to Budget and regulatory decisions at home. The seven-to-two decision was written by the Chief Justice, Warren Burger. It said that Congress violated the Constitution when it passed laws granting powers to the President and Government agencies under his control and at the same time retained veto powers ovdr decisions which resulted from those powers. The decision was made on a law which allows the House of Representatives or Senate to overrule deportation decisions made by the United States Attorney-Gen-eral.

in 1975 the House used the provision to overrule an Executive branch action allowing Jagdish Ray Chadha, a native of Kenya, to remain in the United States because of hardship he might face if deported. The House argued that Mr Chadha would not face hardship if sent back to Kenya. Mr Chadha, who has since married an American citizen and lives in the United States, successfully attacked the provision in the lower courts. The Court said that since Congress had given the at-torney-general the authority not to deport Mr Chadha after his student visa expired on June 30, 1972, then it must stand by that law. “Congress must abide by its delegation of authority until that delegation is legislatively altered or revoked,” Mr Justice Burger wrote. Two Associate Justices, Byron White and William Rehnquist, dissented from yesterday’s opinion, and Mr Justice White said that it, “sounds the death-knell for nearly 200 other statutory provisions in which Congress has reserved a legislative veto.” “It has become a central means by which Congress secures the accountability of Executive and independent agencies," he said. In dozens of laws approved in the last 50 years Congress has retained veto powers which presidents have steadfastly refused to recognise in several controversial cases. Under some of these laws Congress can overturn a decision by a vote of only one House of the legislature.