Line Item Veto Act of 1996
The
Line Item Veto Act of 1996 enacted a
line-item veto for the
Federal Government of the United States, but its effect was brief due to
judicial review.
The bill was signed into law by
President Bill Clinton on
April 9,
1996 and was immediately challenged in the
United States District Court for the District of Columbia by a group of six senators, first among whom was
Senator Robert Byrd (D-WV), where it was declared unconstitutional by
District Judge Harry Jackson, a
Reagan appointee, on
April 10,
1997. The case was subsequently remanded by the
Supreme Court of the United States with instructions to dismiss on the grounds that the senators had not suffered sufficient injury to press charges under
Article III of the
United States Constitution. The case,
Raines v. Byrd, , was handed down on
June 26,
1997, and did not include a judgement on the constitutional grounds of the law.
It was used against one provision of the
Balanced Budget Act of 1997 and two provisions of the Taxpayer Relief Act of 1997 before being challenged again in two separate cases; one by the
City of New York, two hospital associations, one hospital, and two health care unions; the other by a farmers' cooperative from
Idaho and an individual member of the cooperative. Senators
Byrd,
Moynihan,
Levin, and
Hatfield again opposed the law, this time through
Amicus curiæ briefs.
United States District Court Judge Thomas Hogan combined the cases and declared the law
unconstitutional on
February 12,
1998. This ruling was subsequently affirmed on
June 25, 1998 by a 6-3 decision of the
Supreme Court of the United States in the case
Clinton v. City of New York. Justices
Breyer,
Scalia, and
O'Connor dissented.
Here is the
way the line item veto worked:
* Congress passed a piece of spending/tax legislation.
* The President signed the bill, as a whole, but then lined out the specific items he opposed.
* The President returned the lined-out items to Congress, which by a simple majority either approved or disapproved.
* If it disapproved, Congress sent a "bill of disapproval" containing the items back to the President.
* The President could then veto the disapproval bill; it then required a two-thirds majority in Congress to override his veto.
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