This paper will engage linguistic and historical analysis in an effort to discern the original public meaning of the phrase executive power as used in Article II of the United States Constitution. In light of significant modern controversy surrounding the proper limits of executive authority, an original meaning interpretation of
If a federal official is deliberately violating the Constitution, is it possible no federal court has the power to halt that conduct? Federal judges have been answering “yes” for more than a century— dismissing certain kinds of lawsuits alleging unconstitutional conduct by ruling the lawsuits were not “cases” as meant
This study presents a new analysis of an iconic United States Supreme Court case, Holy Trinity Church v. United States (1892). The question in Holy Trinity Church concerned whether a law making it illegal to pay the transportation of a person entering the U.S. under contract to perform “labor
The United States Constitution prohibits federal officials from receiving any “present, Emolument, Office or Title” from a foreign state without the consent of Congress. In interpreting the Constitution’s text, we are to be guided “by the principle that ‘[t]he Constitution was written to be understood by the voters;
The last Amendment included in the Bill of Rights, the Tenth Amendment, states: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”1 Employed as a tool to invalidate statutes2 and
