I'm interested in conflicts between the different branches of the American government, and I remembered that Chief Justice John Marshall had ruled against Andrew Jackson's interest in dealing with the Native American populations. But upon further inspection, it appears that despite the famous quote of Jackson's "John Marshall has made his decision; now let him enforce it!", the ruling in Worcester v Georgia was actually not a constitutional crisis.
Marshall ruled that Georgia did not have the ability to regulate the interaction between Georgians and the Cherokee; instead, only the federal government has that power. Georgia did comply and they freed Worcester eventually, but Andrew Jackson had nothing to enforce, since the federal government was not a party to the suit. Moreover, the Indian Removal Act had already been passed, and so the removal of native tribes on the Trail of Tears continued, with Marshall's ruling changing nothing.
I'm looking for other court cases where the president actually defied the courts. The only one I could find was Ex parte Merryman.
Apparently Chief Justice Taney (in the capacity of a Circuit Court) ruled that Lincoln had unconstitutionally suspended habeas corpus during the Civil War. The court ruled only Congress has that power. Lincoln and the US Army defied the order, but eventually Congress sort of said retroactively that it was ok. Some other courts agreed with Taney, but Lincoln ignored them and kept arresting people without trial. Eventually Congress suspended Habeas Corpus officially in 1863, two years after the case.
Interestingly, in United States v Nixon, Nixon did comply and turn over the tapes, despite it likely ending his presidency. If he had refused, would the court have been able to hold him in contempt and had U.S. Marshals arrest him? Technically, they are part of the Justice Department, so that seems like it might not even work, as the Justice Department answers to the president.
Are there any other cases where the president just ignored the courts, especially the Supreme Court?
Edit: added link I forgot to Indian Removal Act.
Well, if you're interested in disputes between the branches, then you might be interested in the time when President Truman took over the steel mills through executive order despite Congress explicitly saying he couldn't do it.
In Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer, 343 U.S. 579 (1952) Harry Truman, in an effort to maintain production in the steel companies amid a disastrous strike, wanted to nationalize them. See, at the time, North Korea had just invaded, thus beginning the Korean War. When the workers at the steel mills decided to strike, President Truman did not want it to interfere with defense contractor demands. He then directed the Secretary of Commerce to take over the steel mills so that production can continue. The steel mills of course sued.
President Truman relied on his executive emergency powers and supported his assertion that through the Taft-Hardly Act, Congress was silent whether a president can do this without congressional authorization. He was wrong. In fact, congress explicitly denied a provision allowing a president to have such power when the Act was created. So, the Supreme Court said no, no, no. Your powers fit into one of these Categories:
- When the President acts pursuant to an express or implied authorization of Congress, his authority is at its maximum, for it includes all that he possesses in his own right plus all that Congress can delegate. In these circumstances, and in these only, may he be said (for what it may be worth), to personify the federal sovereignty. If his act is held unconstitutional under these circumstances, it usually means that the Federal Government as an undivided whole lacks power. A seizure executed by the President pursuant to an Act of Congress would be supported by the strongest of presumptions and the widest latitude of judicial interpretation, and the burden of persuasion would rest heavily upon any who might attack it.
- When the President acts in absence of either a congressional grant or denial of authority, he can only rely upon his own independent powers, but there is a zone of twilight in which he and Congress may have concurrent authority, or in which its distribution is uncertain. Therefore, congressional inertia, indifference or quiescence may sometimes, at least as a practical matter, enable, if not invite, measures on independent presidential responsibility. In this area, any actual test of power is likely to depend on the imperatives of events and contemporary imponderables rather than on abstract theories of law.
- When the President takes measures incompatible with the expressed or implied will of Congress, his power is at its lowest ebb, for then he can rely only upon his own constitutional powers minus any constitutional powers of Congress over the matter. Courts can sustain exclusive Presidential control in such a case only be disabling the Congress from acting upon the subject. Presidential claim to a power at once so conclusive and preclusive must be scrutinized with caution, for what is at stake is the equilibrium established by our constitutional system.
Id. at 637 (J. Jackson, concurring ). In placing executive action in one of these categories, they chose the third because of the fact that Congress explicitly denied that very povision that would allow this kind of action to happen. Therefore, his actions needed to be evaluated with scrutiny. In doing so, the Court held that the Executive was making law by doing this, and that is not allowed.
Following the Court's decision, Truman immediately returned the mills to the owners, and the strike carried on for another fifty days. It is arguable whether he ended up getting what he wanted in the end since he effectively ended the strike during the litigation, and only suffered another month and a half of strikes.
This case is a landmark case in executive overreaching, and many courts including the Supreme Court have relied on its decision to check the powers of the executive branch.
EDIT: as many of you pointed out, I left out a key fact and fudged its impact. This quote is from the concurring Justice Robert J. Jackson's opinion. It's analysis was adopted later as /u/PM_ME_STUFFZ pointed out. Nonetheless, this zoning of the presidential powers was huge in conlaw. Thanks for the help guys!
As a follow up, did Jackson actually say that about Marshall enforcing his own decision? It smells like an apocryphal quote to me, and I haven't been able to find the primary source from whence it came.
I hope someone can chime in because I do not have a deep historical knowledge of the event, but didn't FDR threaten the Supreme Court concerning the execution of Nazi sympathizers that were trying to bomb a ship in the New York harbor?