Does President Trump have legal authority acting on his own to impose large import taxes on products coming from otherwise friendly countries?I looked at reasons the Court might rule one way or the other here, here, and here. Of the three posts, I consider the third the most interesting and, to my not-legally-trained mind, the best outcome.
Trump is relying on a 1977 law that empowers the president to act when faced with an "unusual and extraordinary threat" from abroad. The measure does not mention tariffs or taxes.
In a pair of cases, lower courts ruled the tariffs were illegal but kept them in place for now. Trump administration lawyers argue the justices should defer to the president because tariffs involve foreign affairs and national security.
The article is titled "Here Are 5 Major Supreme Court Cases to Be Argued This Fall." Aside from the dates given for each case, the most striking thing is just how much government meddling there is in our lives even aside from Trump's capricious, illegal, and unpredictable import taxes.
Here is a list of the other four cases, followed by my quick, laissez-faire take on each. (There can be more to say about what a proper ruling would look like in each case, given the fact that we live in a mixed economy, but I am passing over that.)
- Conversion Therapy and Free Speech: The government has no business licensing, let alone directly interfering with the speech of mental health counselors, let alone members of any other profession. Simply by being involved in setting standards (a task which can and should be performed by market actors), the government is limiting speech and interfering with freedom of contract.
- Voting Rights and Black Majority Districts: The government should ensure equal numbers of people per representative, regardless of any other consideration, perhaps barring geographic proximity. Incidentally, the less the government does that isn't its proper job -- protecting individual rights -- the less of a temptation there would be to gerrymander in the first place.
- Transgender Athletes and School Sports: The state shouldn't be operating schools or meddling in how people choose to organize athletic competitions among themselves or their own children.
- Trump and Independent Agencies: At last, a case that could conceivably occur within a completely free country! I say, could, though. In a freer society there would be very few such agencies and less surface area for infection by party politics/temptation for a power-luster to install cronies.
-- CAV