Libertarian Senator Doesn't Realize That Authority Was Delegated To The Executive 90 Years Ago
Rand Paul’s recent push to reassert Congressional authority over tariffs, particularly in response to Apple’s 2025 shift of iPhone production to India amid U.S.-China trade tensions, highlights a fundamental misunderstanding of the legislative branch’s eroded powers. Historically, Congress held the constitutional authority to regulate commerce and set tariffs under Article I, Section 8. However, over the past century, it has increasingly delegated these powers to the executive branch through laws like the Tariff Act of 1930, the Trade Expansion Act of 1962, and the Trade Act of 1974. These acts granted the president broad discretion to adjust tariffs for national security, economic stability, or foreign policy reasons—discretion that has been upheld by courts and expanded under administrations like Trump’s, which imposed tariffs on China, and Biden’s, which maintained them. Paul’s call for Congress to “take back” this authority ignores the reality that such delegation is deeply entrenched, with the executive now wielding tools like Section 232 and Section 301 to act unilaterally on trade.
The practical barriers to Congress reclaiming tariff-setting power are immense, and Paul’s stance seems to overlook this. Retrieving delegated authority would require new legislation to amend or repeal the existing trade acts—a process that demands a unified Congress willing to challenge the executive. In today’s polarized political climate, achieving the necessary votes is nearly impossible, especially when tariffs are tied to contentious issues like national security or economic competition with China. For instance, the 2018 attempt to pass the United States Reciprocal Trade Act, which aimed to limit presidential tariff powers, failed to gain traction despite bipartisan frustration with Trump’s trade policies. Moreover, the Supreme Court’s reluctance to interfere in executive trade actions, as seen in its 1976 ruling in Federal Energy Administration v. Algonquin, further solidifies the president’s dominance in this arena. Paul’s rhetoric about Congress reasserting control sounds principled but clashes with the structural realities of modern governance, where speed and flexibility in trade policy often favor executive action over legislative deliberation.
Beyond tariffs, Paul’s broader frustration with Congress’s forfeited powers—such as war declarations, budgeting, and emergency declarations—reflects a century-long trend of legislative deference to the executive, which he seems to underestimate. Since the 1930s, Congress has ceded ground on everything from the New Deal’s expansion of federal agencies to the 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF), which gave presidents near-blanket authority for military actions. Efforts to claw back these powers, like the 2020 push to repeal the AUMF, have consistently failed due to partisan gridlock and Congress’s own reluctance to take on the political risks of decision-making. Paul, a libertarian-leaning senator, often champions a strict constitutionalist view, but his calls for Congress to reclaim its authority ring hollow without a feasible path forward. The modern presidency, backed by legal precedent and Congressional inaction, has amassed powers that are unlikely to be relinquished without a seismic shift in political will—a shift that Paul’s proposals, while ideologically sound, fail to address with actionable strategy.
