Pressure to terminate war controls intensified following the September 2, 1945, signing of the Japanese instrument of surrender. On September 14, House Concurrent Resolution 84 was introduced, “to terminate the effectiveness of certain provisions of the Second War Power Act, 1942.” Section 1501 of the Act provided for termination of certain of the Titles of the Act by concurrent resolution.[638] The resolution did not emerge from the Judiciary Committee, to which it was referred. Another unsuccessful effort was made to invoke the concurrent resolution provisions of the Act two years later.[639] The year following termination of hostilities saw a short-lived effort to terminate by concurrent resolution a statute which did not incorporate provision to this effect.[640]
Some ten additional concurrent resolutions were introduced in the two years succeeding 1945, the effect of which would have been formal termination of the state of hostilities to which the lives of various statutes had been hinged.[641] None of the resolutions emerged from committee.
Enabling and Requiring Executive Action: Aside from action on reorganization plans submitted to Congress by the President, the sole striking instance of successful employment of a concurrent resolution provision incorporated in a delegatory statute concerned initiation of a postwar highway construction program, under the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1944. The Act, it will be recalled, enabled the Congress by concurrent resolution to stipulate the date the program was to go into effect. Senate and House concurrent resolutions were introduced in the Seventy-ninth Congress in 1945 fixing the first post-war fiscal year under the Act as the year ending June 30, 1946.[642] The House resolution passed in that chamber and was agreed to by the Senate.[643]
The Neutrality Act of 1939 is the outstanding, in fact the only, recent instance of congressional effort to exercise power by concurrent resolution to require executive action.[644] The Act drastically curbed American carriage to and trade with belligerents. The President could proclaim the existence of war between two nations; or, upon passage of a concurrent resolution finding that war existed between two countries, the President must issue a proclamation identifying the belligerents.[645] Thereupon the trade restrictions in the Act become effective and criminal penalty attaches to their violation.
On the theory that Section 1 (a) “places on this Congress a responsibility corresponding with that which has been placed on the President in the matter of finding a condition of war to exist,”[646] individual members introduced concurrent resolutions declaring the existence of war between the U.S.S.R. and Finland,[647] Japan and China,[648] and Germany and the U.S.S.R.[649] These were decently interred in committee.
The Legislative Veto: Although the first Reorganization Act containing provision for legislative veto of reorganization plans was enacted in 1939, concurrent resolutions disapproving such plans were introduced in vain until 1946. In July of that year both houses agreed to House Concurrent Resolution 155 disapproving President Truman’s Reorganization Plan No. 1.[650] The next May a new Congress disapproved Reorganization Plan No. 2 of 1947.[651] The third and last reorganization plan to be defeated by concurrent resolution was Plan No. 1, 1948, which incurred congressional disapproved in March of that year.[652] The Reorganization Act of 1949 permitted veto of the President’s plans by simple resolution of one house.[653] President Truman’s efforts to elevate the Federal Security Agency to departmental status were frustrated by Senate Resolution 147 of 1949, which was adopted by that body on August 16, 1949.[654] All of the veto resolutions passed by Congress were favorably reported from committee to the house of origin.
During the period studied three veto resolutions died in committee,[655] three (all favorably reported from committee) passed the House of Representatives only to be rejected by the Senate,[656] and four were adversely reported from committee and defeated in the chamber in which they originated.[657] Only one veto resolution was discharged from committee. It subsequently passed the House but failed in the Senate.[658]
Conclusion
In an era in which governmental controls invade every sphere of human activity, from economic to cultural and political, administrative responsibility is essential to the maintenance of the democratic system. Administration which is responsible is lacking in the elements of bad faith, arbitrariness, or capriciousness. It constitutes a reasoned effort, in good faith, to approximate the legislative intent.
Congress is one important source of oversight of administration. Its effectiveness in performing this role is a function of (a) the adequacy of its tools, and the skill, conscience, and sustained interest of the members in wielding them, and (b) the standards it applies in measuring the adequacy of administrative action.