This came up a few months ago when people were saying “But wait, congress has power to set tariff policy”. That was true until the Smoot-Hawley act that is often blamed (probably correctly) for triggering or at least greatly exacerbating the Great Depression. After that, congress ceded tariff control to the executive. AFAIK, there’s nothing stopping congress from taking it back, but I can’t see the current congress doing that.
there seem to be about five provisions (according to politifact) trump can use but according to the constitution tariff power lies with congress and i cant imagine any of these provisions were originally supposed to enable the president to enact tariffs quite in the way he does. I mean its obvious he is getting away with it so its a moot point either way but we can at least vent i guess.
This came up a few months ago when people were saying “But wait, congress has power to set tariff policy”. That was true until the Smoot-Hawley act that is often blamed (probably correctly) for triggering or at least greatly exacerbating the Great Depression. After that, congress ceded tariff control to the executive. AFAIK, there’s nothing stopping congress from taking it back, but I can’t see the current congress doing that.
there seem to be about five provisions (according to politifact) trump can use but according to the constitution tariff power lies with congress and i cant imagine any of these provisions were originally supposed to enable the president to enact tariffs quite in the way he does. I mean its obvious he is getting away with it so its a moot point either way but we can at least vent i guess.