The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation: Annotations of Cases Decided by the Supreme Court of the United States to June 30, 1952
History
The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation: Annotations of Cases Decided by the Supreme Court of the United States to June 30, 1952
Constitutional law -- United States; Constitutions -- United States
The war power "is not limited to victories in the field. * * * It
carries with it inherently the power to guard against the immediate
renewal of the conflict, and to remedy the evils which have arisen from
its rise and progress."[1285] Accordingly, the Supreme Court held in
1871 that it was within the competence of Congress to deduct from the
period limited by statute for the bringing of an action the time during
which plaintiff had been unable to prosecute his suit in consequence of
the Civil War. This principle was given a much broader application after
the first world war in Hamilton _v._ Kentucky Distilleries and Wine
Co.,[1286] where the War Time Prohibition Act adopted after the signing
of the Armistice was upheld as an appropriate measure for increasing war
efficiency. It was conceded that the measure was valid when enacted,
since the mere cessation of hostilities did not end the war or terminate
the war powers of Congress. The plaintiff contended however that in
October 1919, when the suit was brought, the war emergency had in fact
passed, and that the law was therefore obsolete. Inasmuch as the treaty
of peace had not yet been concluded and other war activities had not
been brought to a close, the Court said it was "unable to conclude" that
the act had ceased to be valid. But in 1924 it held upon the facts that
we judicially know that the rent control law for the District of
Columbia, which had previously been upheld,[1287] had ceased to operate
because the emergency which justified it had come to an end.[1288] A
similar issue was present after World War II in Woods _v._ Miller,[1289]
where the Supreme Court reversed a decision of a lower court to the
effect that the authority of Congress to regulate rents by virtue of the
war power ended with the Presidential proclamation terminating
hostilities on December 31, 1946. This decision was coupled with a
warning that: "We recognize the force of the argument that the effects
of war under modern conditions may be felt in the economy for years and
years, and that if the war power can be used in days of peace to treat
all the wounds which war inflicts on our society, it may not only
swallow up all other powers of Congress but largely obliterate the Ninth
and the Tenth Amendments as well. There are no such implications in
today's decision."[1290] In 1948, a sharply divided Court further ruled
that the power which Congress has conferred upon the President to deport
enemy aliens in time of a declared war was not exhausted when the
shooting war stopped. Speaking for the majority of five, Justice
Frankfurter declared: "It is not for us to question a belief by the
President that enemy aliens who were justifiably deemed fit subjects for
internment during active hostilites [sic] do not lose their potency for
mischief during the period of confusion and conflict which is
characteristic of a state of war even when the guns are silent but the
peace of Peace has not come."[1291]
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