Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/524bv.pdf
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Cite as: 524 U. S. 417 (1998)

495

Breyer, J., dissenting

by Congress.” Skinner v. Mid-America Pipeline Co., 490
I do not believe the Court would hold the
U. S., at 222.
same delegations at issue in J. W. Hampton and Field uncon-
stitutional were they to arise in a more obviously domestic
area.

Finally, the tax-related delegation is limited in ways that
tend to diminish any widespread risk of arbitrary Presiden-
tial decisionmaking:

(1) The Act does not give the President authority to
change general tax policy. That is because the limited tax
beneﬁts are deﬁned in terms of deviations from tax policy,
i. e., special beneﬁts to fewer than 100 individuals. See 2
U. S. C. § 691e(9)(A)(i) (1994 ed., Supp. II); see also Analytical
Perpectives 84 (deﬁning “tax expenditure” as “a preferential
exception to the baseline provisions of the tax structure”).
(2) The Act requires the President to make the same kind
of policy judgment with respect to these special beneﬁts as
with respect to items of spending. He is to consider the
budget as a whole, he is to consider the particular history of
the tax beneﬁt provision, and he is to consider whether the
provision is worth the loss of revenue it causes in the same
way that he must decide whether a particular expenditure
item is worth the added revenue that it requires. See
supra, at 484–485.

(3) The delegated authority does not destroy any individu-
al’s expectation of receiving a particular beneﬁt, for the Act
is written to say to the small group of taxpayers who may
receive the beneﬁt, “Taxpayers, you will receive an exemp-
tion from ordinary tax laws, but only if the President decides
the budgetary loss is not too great.”

(4) The “limited tax beneﬁt” provisions involve only a
small part of the federal budget, probably less than one per-
cent of total annual outlays and revenues. Compare Budget
303 (federal outlays and receipts in 1997 were both over $1.5
trillion) with App. to Juris. Statement 71a (President’s can-
cellation message for Snake River appellees’ limited tax ben-