Thursday, May 29, 2025

NRO: Tariff Power Lies With Congress, Not the President

The decisive argument, IMO:
We have been frequent critics of Donald Trump’s tariffs, but we understand that there is a case to be made for reconsidering some of our trade policies. The place to make that case is Congress — not by unilateral presidential declaration of open-ended worldwide “emergencies.” The Founders rebelled against taxation without representation; they did not mean for the executive to control the duties on all imports by daily whim.
It is Congress that was granted power by the Constitution to “lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises” and to “regulate Commerce with foreign Nations,” and for good reason. It is Congress that can set policies that are stable and predictable for business, our allies, and our adversaries. The representative branch’s policymaking may not be pretty, but it includes the greatest number of people in the most deliberative fashion in balancing competing policy concerns and getting buy-in from people likely to face the voters again soon. That’s how we have always set tax policy, and tariffs are nothing if not taxes.
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From here, the case likely goes to the federal circuit and, quite possibly, the Supreme Court. It would be better in all events for Trump to go to Congress instead, or for Congress to act on its own. But if the president persists in claiming worldwide, perpetual powers unconstrained by any specific rules, it will be the duty of the judiciary to stand against taxation without proper representation. It would be better still if the courts made clear that no Congress can give such powers away.

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