On February 20, in Learning Resources, Inc. v. Trump and V.O.S. Selections v. United States, the Supreme Court held in a 6-3 decision authored by Chief Justice Roberts that the President exceeded his authority under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (“IEEPA”) by imposing tariffs pursuant to emergency executive orders.

The administration argued that the tariffs were “regulatory,” not “revenue-raising,” asserting that the IEEPA’s authority to “regulate importation” permitted the measures as “foreign-facing regulation of foreign commerce.” The revenue generated, it contended during oral argument, was merely “incidental.”

The Court was not persuaded. Emphasizing the breadth of these tariffs—which imposed duties across broad categories of imported goods without clear limits on amount or duration—and citing early precedent addressing Congress’s taxing authority, the Court concluded that the power to impose tariffs is “very clearly . . . a branch of the taxing power” of Congress under Article I—authority the IEEPA does not confer.

What this means for the future of tariffs under the current administration remains to be seen. It is clear, however, that any comparable tariff regime will require congressional authorization.

We’ll keep you posted in BrassTax.