Thread by @nycsouthpaw

This letter cites a CRS report as its authority that a statute which puts an unconditional “shall furnish” requirement on the Treasury to provide requested tax returns is nevertheless conditioned by constitutional limitations on congressional investigations broadly.

https://twitter.com/mkraju/status/1117827426040594434

That CRS report cites *drumroll* no authority whatsoever!

It reasons that the statute “can probably be viewed as a statutory delegation of Congress’s investigative and oversight powers to the tax committees” and thus “arguably” the constitutional limits on those powers apply.

Here’s the CRS report: fas.org/sgp/crs/secrec…

I think its reasoning is manifestly bonkers, and so meekly presented that even its author doesn’t appear to be convinced.

To start with, under the Constitution each house of Congress determines the rules of its own proceedings—including each committee’s jurisdiction, who has subpoena power, etc. This internal allocation of authority doesn’t require a statute, and it’s not usually called delegation.

(Delegation, in this context, typically refers to situations where some of Congress’s legislative authority is given to executive branch officials—e.g. allowing them to make legally binding regulations. There’s lots of cases on that kind of delegation, a totally separate topic.)

A statute directing an official to hand over information when asked by the tax committees is not plausibly delegation of Congress’s investigative powers. It’s the exercise of the law-making power that the Constitution grants to Congress and the President acting in concert.

Anyways it’s not terribly important why I think the Trump attorneys’ and CRS’s argument is wrong. The main point is there’s no authority behind it. No court had held this way afaik, and no one will feel bound by CRS’s dashed off musings.

There is authority to suggest, however, that a court is likely to take the plain language of the statute quite seriously.