sense. While in legislating for a conquered country he may disregard the laws of that country, he is not wholly above the laws of his own.... His power to administer would be absolute, but his power to legislate would not be without certain restrictions,-in other words, they would not extend beyond the necessities of the case.

131

Suffice it to say, for our purposes, that the power of the President is more limited after the cession than it was before that event and during the war. Before cession the limits are largely, if not wholly, to be found in the laws of war,1 which give him a power as broad as the necessity requires, with certain general limitations; 182 and in the absence of statutory limitation he is the sole judge of the extent of his powers. After cession the government he has set up may be continued until Congress acts; but there are the constitutional limitations with reference to government in territory under American sovereignty; 133 and existing acts of Congress are more apt to apply.134 In general, the power to legislate is probably limited to what the exigencies of the situation demand.135

Into the limitations of this power we need not go any further than to say that the Supreme Court has pointed out several limitations in the decided cases.136 It may not, however, be out of place to mention the decision in the case of Fleming v. Page.137 In that case the question was whether duties could be collected upon goods imported from Tampico, Mexico, under the tariff act of 1846, during the time when that place was held in the Mexican War by the forces of the United States acting under the authority of the President as commander-in-chief. The Court, speaking through Chief Justice Taney, held that such duties could be collected, since Tampico was a foreign port within the meaning of the tariff act. Tampico, said the Chief Justice, was temporarily in the

131 Ibid.

132 Hall, International Law, chap. iv.

133 Willoughby, op. cit., sec. 722.

134 They were applied in the Dooley case. 135 Cf. Willoughby, op. cit., sec. 722.

See the opinion.

130 For examples, see Raymond v. Thomas, 91 U. S. 712; Jecker v. Montgomery, 13 Wall. 498.

187 9 How. 603.

possession of the United States, and, as against the rest of the world, a part thereof during such possession; but it was not a part of the Union in the meaning of the tariff act, because the authority of the President to conquer enemy territory during the war did not include the power to acquire permanent sovereignty over the same, and conquest did not of itself extend the boundaries of the Union. That can only be done by the legislative or treaty making powers. It is true that this principle is broader than the facts of the case warranted. For the President had not attempted to turn military occupation into acquisition. Strict adherence to the facts, therefore, leads us to say that the Court held, first that the revenue laws applied only to goods from foreign territories, and secondly that occupation did not per se result in changing the status of previously foreign territory; and that it indicated that in a proper case it might hold that the President could not, if he tried, turn occupation into acquisition.

PART IV

POLITICAL INTERPRETATION

CHAPTER X

POLITICAL IMPLICATIONS AND POTENTIALITIES OF THE ORDINANCE MAKING POWERS OF THE PRESIDENT

The subject, as it is needless to debate here, has its own difficulties, which are not peculiar to any stage or form of government. The executive power in the state must have certain powers to act in cases for which legislation has not provided, and modern legislation has not got beyond the expedient of investing the executive with authority to meet such critical occasions.

-STUBBS.1

Although the general scheme of administrative organization should be provided by legislative act, provision should be made for enabling the governor to meet emergencies by conferring on him the power to redistribute functions among administrative agencies in the interest of economy and efficiency, on the analogy of the power conferred on the President by the Overman Act. In the interests of efficiency and flexibility, the duties and functions of the administrative officers and employees should be determined to a large extent by executive orders and regulations rather than by detailed provisions of legislative acts. The director of each department should be empowered to prescribe regulations, not inconsistent with law, for the government of his department, the conduct of its employees, and the distribution and performance of its business.

-MATHEWS."

Der formelle Sinn der Verordnung ergibt sich aus dem Satz der konstitutionellen Doktrin, dasz die Volksvertretung einen Anteil an der Regelung der Rechtsordnung, aber nicht an der Leitung der Verwaltung, eine Mitwirkung an dem Erlasz der Gesetze, aber nicht an dem Erlasz der Verordnungen hat.

-LABAND.

Un Etat qui s'imposerait de vivre exclusivement sur ses lois, en ce sens que son activité serait indéfinement enchaînée à des décisions ou mesures prises préalablement par voie législative, un tel Etat se

1

1 Constitutional History of England, vol. ii, p. 619; cf. Carr, Delegated Legislation, p. 21 ff.

"State Administrative Reorganization," in American Political Science Review, August, 1922.

Deutsches Reichsstaatsrecht, sec. 16 (Das Öffentliche Recht der Gegenwart, Band 1).

mettrait pratiquement dans l'impossibilité de subsister: et de fait, aucun Etat de cette sorte n'existe nulle part. . . . Dans la plupart des cas en effet, les lois se bornent à poser des règles générales et abstraites, c'est-à-dire à fixer de façon préventive un certain ordre juridique pour l'avenir. Or, il est manifeste que la loi ne saurait tout prévoir. .. La procédure législative, avec ses longueurs, ne se prête guère l'adoption de mesures qui demandent à être prises rapidement, afin de faire face immédiatement aux circonstances passagères; en outre, les assemblées législatives ne possèdent ni les moyens d'information, ni les capacités techniques, indispensables pour déterminer convenablement ces mesures, c'est là une mission que l'autorité administrative est seule capable de bien remplir. . . . La Constitution . . . n'a pas admis les assemblées à siéger en permanence, et pourtant, dans les intervalles des sessions, il faut bien que l'Etat garde le possibilité de prendre, par le voie administrative, les mesures de circonstance dont le besoin se fait constamment sentir. D'autre part, il est non moins manifeste que ces mesures, précisément parce qu'elles dépendent des événements journaliers et varient suivant les faits qui les provoquent, devront pouvoir être décidées par l'autorité administrative à qui elles incombent, d'après les besoins du moment, donc librement, avec un pouvoir d'appréciation actuelle. . . . Mais alors, il n'est guère exacte de ramener l'administration à une idée d'exécution passive des lois. . . . Exécuter la loi, au sens donné par Rousseau au mot exécution, ou tenir de la loi un pouvoir d'action et de volonté, ce sont là deux notions différentes. -CARRÉ DE MALBERG.

...

Half the statutes on our books are in the alternative, depending on the discretion of some person or persons to whom is confided the duty of determining whether the proper occasion exists for executing them. But it cannot be said that the exercise of such discretion is the making of the law.

-Moers v. City of Reading."

Si le législateur établit des règles abstraites et statue pour l'ensemble d'un vaste territoire, il est de toute évidence qu'il ne peut tout prévoir, ni les obstacles pouvant résulter des circonstances de temps ou des circonstances de lieu, ni les conditions contingentes et transitoires d'application. Tout n'est donc pas dit dans la loi et quand il s'agira de la mettre à exécution, c'est-à-dire, d'imposer les directions qu'elle ordonne, il faudra souvent donner aux principes très compréhensifs qu'elle contient, les developpements nécessaires et la mettre en état de produire son maximum d'utilité, en un mot, la compléter.

-RAIGA.

The ordinance making power is a problem for the political scientist as well as a subject of study for the jurist, the historian, and the students of comparative government, of ad

• Théorie générale de l'Etat, tome 1, p. 467. The reference should be read in full.

21 Penn. St. 188, 202.

Le Pouvoir réglementaire du Président de la République (1900), pp. 6-7.

ministrative organization and technique, and of constitutional law. What is its relation to the theory of democracy as understood in America? To the principle of modern governments that legislation be by or with the consent of the popular assembly? To the increasing growth of the regulative functions of government in the present generation? To the question of the proper relation which should subsist between the legislative and executive branches of government? What are the social and economic causes of the development of the ordinance making power in the United States? What are the implications of the power and its potentialities of future development? These and similar questions can be answered only by the political scientist.

The problem is not, however, the same for all classes of 'nances. In particular it is quite different in respect to the power of issuing independent ordinances from what it is in regard to the power of co-legislation. Again, it is not the same for the type of ordinance which embodies material law as it is for that type which contains material ordinances and co-ordinances. Naturally, it also makes a great deal of difference whether the power is connected with emergencies or whether it is connected with the administration of laws of social and industrial regulation in ordinary times and circumstances. Finally, it is just as clear that with reference to all these classes it must be decided whether the power is to be given directly by the fundamental law or left to delegation by the legislature in permanent or temporary statutes as it may see fit. If any one type of ordinance be taken, it must be considered in relation to the other three bases of classification.

If now we start with the problem of the emergency ordinance, some general conclusions may be ventured. In the

See the divisions of this treatise: Part I. Juristic Analysis; Part II. Constitutional Development; Part III. Constitutional Construction; Part IV. Political Interpretation; Part V. (Appendix) Technical Analysis. If space allowed, there might be added Parts on the Historical Setting and Comparative Analysis.

* See the four major bases of classification of ordinances set forth in chap. iii.