Statutory Interpretation and the Presidency: The Hierarchy of "Executive History".

It is said that the Great Depression and the New Deal era fundamentally altered the role that America's federal government played in American society as the American public increasingly turned to the national government for solutions to social and economic problems. Each branch of the federal government changed as a result of this increased public interest. Congress, for instance, began passing more laws on an increasingly large array of topics, and as the constitutionality of these laws was challenged in court, America's judicial system had more statutory interpretation questions filling its docket. These changes to America's legislative and judicial systems, however, are dwarfed by those of its executive branch of government. During this era, the presidency became the most prominent branch of the federal government, and as a result, the President began exerting more authority in all aspects of governing, including congressional lawmaking. The post-New Deal Presidents also sought to extend the executive branch's influence over the judiciary's role in interpreting legislation by more frequently issuing signing statements that articulated their Administration's understanding of a law. These Presidents hoped that such articulations would result in greater judicial resolution of legislative ambiguity issues in the executive branch's favor. The judiciary, though, has largely disregarded the President's increased role in the lawmaking process as it has tackled statutory interpretation questions. For instance, the courts often resolve ambiguity in statutory text by looking to extrinsic interpretative aids like legislative history in order to ascertain the congressional intent behind the statute. Presidential interpretative aids such as signing statements, in contrast, are only occasionally consulted. The notion that the courts should consult presidential materials, i.e. "executive history," for statutory interpretation purposes is a controversial topic; some have even argued that the practice itself is unconstitutional. This Article first examines the constitutional concerns surrounding judicial use of executive history and shows that the practice is constitutional for statutory interpretation purposes. However, like any judicial interpretative aid, presidential materials have varying degrees of reliability and authoritative value. This Article accordingly proposes a new organizational scheme for executive history in general—a hierarchal model similar to the one that exists for legislative history—and thus shows what types of executive history the courts should be more inclined to reference. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]