Warrantless Searches, Tariffs, and the Unitary Executive: 3 SCOTUS Cases To Watch This Fall

In a new Supreme Court term packed with big cases, these disputes stand out.

The U.S. Supreme Court is officially back in session this week, kicking off a new term that is already packed with major cases dealing with some of the most contentious and consequential issues of our time. As the Court's fall term gets underway, here are the three big cases that I will be tracking most closely.

1. Case v. Montana

The Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution protects "the right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures." Most of the time, that means that law enforcement may not enter your home without a warrant.

But the federal courts have also carved out a big exception to the warrant requirement for home entry when an emergency is (or might be) afoot.

That emergency exception to the Fourth Amendment is at the heart of this case, which asks the justices to decide the following question: "Whether law enforcement may enter a home without a search warrant based on less than probable cause that an emergency is occurring, or whether the emergency-aid exception requires probable cause." If the cops think—or claim to think—that an emergency might be happening inside, is that enough to allow the cops to bust down the door and start searching?

Oral arguments in Case v. Montana are scheduled for October 15.

2. Learning Resources v. Trump

According to Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution, the authority "to lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises," as well as the authority "to regulate Commerce with Foreign nations," resides exclusively in the hands of Congress.

Yet President Donald Trump has unilaterally imposed tariffs on much of the world without receiving any kind of clear authorization from Congress. Is that legal?

In this case, which has been consolidated with the related matter of Trump v. V.O.S. Selections, the Supreme Court will finally weigh in on whether Trump's tariffs violate the constitutional separation of powers. In a SCOTUS term that's full of potentially blockbuster cases, this one is easily among the biggest and most important.

Oral arguments in Learning Resources v. Trump are scheduled for November 5.

3. Trump v. Slaughter

In 1935, the Supreme Court ruled 9–0 against President Franklin Roosevelt, holding that he lacked the lawful power to fire a commissioner of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) for purely political reasons. Yet earlier this year, Trump fired FTC Commissioner Rebecca Slaughter for purely political reasons, arguing that he possessed the power to do so as the head of the executive branch.

This case asks whether Trump does in fact possess the executive power to fire the heads of "independent" federal agencies at will. The case also asks whether the Court's 1935 precedent against Roosevelt should be overturned.

Here's a funny thing about this one: Despite the heated and far-reaching debate over presidential power that it involves, the outcome feels predetermined. That's because the Supreme Court has already allowed Trump's firing of Slaughter to go into effect while the case proceeds, which suggests (but does not guarantee) that Trump is going to win on the merits in a few months. What is less clear is whether the Court will rule in Trump's favor by voiding the past precedent, or will instead hand him the win in a way that narrows the precedent without overruling it outright. We'll see.

Oral arguments in Trump v. Slaughter have not been scheduled yet, but the docket does instruct the Supreme Court's clerk "to establish a briefing schedule that will allow the case to be argued in the December 2025 argument session." So I would expect this one to be argued sometime around mid-December.

Big Picture

Finally, looking at the big picture, here's something additional to ponder. In recent years, a single hot-button issue like abortion or affirmative action has emerged as the big defining story of a given SCOTUS term. This term, the big defining story is presidential power. This means that the big questions heading into the term are whether the Supreme Court will largely defer to Trump's executive assertions, or whether the Court will act as a check on at least some parts of Trump's agenda, such as by striking down his tariffs. To put that another way, will Trump in particular, and executive power in general, emerge stronger than ever as a result of the actions taken this term by a majority of the Supreme Court?

We'll get our first hints as to the answers to those questions in the next few months.

Comments

[Chumby]

The libertarian case for independent government employees.
Fire them all.

[JesseAz (RIP CK)]

No matter what scotus says, Damon will talk about the inferior court judge rulings he agrees with instead.

[Uncle Jay]

You can't fire them all, but you can defund them all.

[Mickey Rat]

The question the courts have to answer is does the constitution grant the office of the president this authority, not whether we want this particular person to wield this power.

The argument against the unitary executive seems to be going against tge checks and balances of the three branch system of government.

[But SkyNet is a Private Company]

lol. What are the checks and balances on an “independent” agency?

[Chumby]

Think Reason sees it like a professor getting tenure. If they don’t work for judicial or legislative, then they work for executive and should be subject to the executive removing them.

[Michael Ejercito]

One question is what the historical pedigree of independent agencies are.

[Keldonric]

The insulation Congress built into the FTC and similar commissions wasn’t decorative — it was the constitutional exchange that made those delegations permissible. If the Court strikes the removal protections but leaves the statutory powers intact, it isn’t pruning a clause; it’s rewriting the bargain Congress enacted.

Authority and insulation were granted together. Severing one from the other creates an agency Congress never authorized — an executive instrument exercising powers that were justified only by their independence. If the removal restriction falls, the delegation should be reconsidered as well; otherwise we end up with executive control over quasi-legislative authority that was constitutional only because it was insulated from executive will.

[Mickey Rat]

Then that is an argument that the FTC should never have been created in the first place.

[JesseAz (RIP CK)]

"constitutional exchange"... wut?

Congress passed a law subverting article 2 powers. They cant do that. There is no such thing as an independent agency.

Congress can not legislate themselves a constitutional power from a different article.

[Michael Ejercito]

So what would be the remedy?

Allowing the President to fire FTC members?

Or holding that the FTC has no police power at all?

Here is an interesting comment on the topic.

https://reason.com/volokh/2025/10/01/caleb-nelsons-originalist-critique-of-unitary-executive-theory/?comments=true#comment-11230140

I don't know.... I mean, even if we assume that congress has SOME power to mandate that a skilled civil service or skilled military profession remain available and on-call for the NEXT president, whether the current president likes it or not....

I could see an argument that Congress possesses the power to bar the President from halting pay and benefits and maybe even information access for certain type of executive-branch employees, simply to ensure that they are retained in service for use by the next president....

But I would still think that the current POTUS has to have the power to place those officials on some sort of paid semi-leave, or at least to block them from issuing any meaningful orders on the President's behalf if he fundamentally does not trust them to be competent or to represent his directions faithfully.

In theory, POTUS almost has to have the power to banish certain executive officials to a library-in-waiting, where they can read departmental documents, write complaints to congress, get paid, and have zero meaningful power, other than maybe a few minions to help them write policy dissents.

[Rossami]

Either of your proposed remedies would be a restoration of the separation of powers that Congress breached when it created unaccountable "fourth" branches of government.

[Sevo, 5-30-24, embarrassment]

^+1!
"The president’s removal authority is key to the separation of powers"
https://pacificlegal.org/the-presidents-removal-authority-is-key-to-the-separation-of-powers/

[Rossami]

The fight over tariffs isn't (or at least shouldn't be) a fight over executive power at all. Rather, it should be an argument over the specificity required for congressional statutes and regulations. If Congress wants to reclaim its sole authority over taxation (including tariffs), it can do so by repealing it's century's worth of vague statutes that granted so much discretion and authority to the executive branch.

[JesseAz (RIP CK)]

This. Damon thinks it is a constitutional argument instead of statutory.

[Roberta]

Is Trump claiming no statutory provision covering tariffs he puts into force?

[Vernon Depner]

He's claiming authority to levy tariffs based on a statute that does not mention tariffs. I expect the court to rule against him.

[Vernon Depner]

is that enough to allow the cops to bust down the door

It doesn't matter if they're "allowed" or not. They will continue to do it, because there are no personal consequences for cops who ignore the Bill of Rights.

[sarcasmic]

Congress won't do their job and courts are corrupt. So we should just do away with them and make Trump a dictator.

[Sevo, 5-30-24, embarrassment]

Gee, I wonder how these cases might be characterized by someone NOT a TDS-ADDLED LYING PILE OF SLIMY SHIT?
Guess we'll have to look elsewhere, unless Reason decides to hire outside the echo-chamber.

[See.More]

This case asks whether Trump does in fact possess the executive power to fire the heads of "independent" federal agencies at will.

There is no such thing as "'independent' federal agencies."

Per Article 1, Section 8, the final clause, Congress has the power, "To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof." So Congress may, by law, create agencies as necessary and proper for executing the laws. But, by definition, those agencies, by "carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers..." (emphasis added) are Executive branch agencies. They simply cannot be "independent" and constitutional.

[AT]

If the cops think—or claim to think—that an emergency might be happening inside, is that enough to allow the cops to bust down the door and start searching?

They'll err on the side of least harm. No way the exigency exception gets taken away.

Yes, there is potential for abuse by law enforcement. It's an acceptable risk. And there's already remedy for that kind of abuse. If you think they're going to legitimize the ludicrously overcautious "emergency response" that occurred in Uvalde, Texas, you're smoking crack.

Yet President Donald Trump has unilaterally imposed tariffs on much of the world without receiving any kind of clear authorization from Congress. Is that legal?

I get why you dumbed this down - I mean, it's Reason. Your target audience is drug-addicted retards on the left.

But what you failed to mention was that it wasn't really unilateral. The argument here is NOT going to be whether he was authorized to impose those specific tariffs - it's going to be whether he was already authorized to impose tariffs in general, due to prior delegations of said power by Congress.

What I'd like to see more from that decision isn't "can he can't he" but an admonishment to Congress - and, by extension, the American Citizen in their abdication of their responsibility to elect representative legislators - about the dangers of delegating powers because they're too incompetent (meaning they don't want to risk unpopular decisions that threaten their re-election) to get anything done on their own so they just keep punting things to the Oval Office.

Because they're (we're) definitely not following the intent of the Founders on that Constitutional subject. I would not put it past SCOTUS to give a "You made this bed, now you sleep in it" ruling on the subject.

the Supreme Court has already allowed Trump's firing of Slaughter to go into effect while the case proceeds, which suggests (but does not guarantee) that Trump is going to win on the merits in a few months.

I wouldn't say that.

Remember, the Supreme Court HATES - WITH EVERY FIBER OF ITS BEING - getting dragged into policy/partisanship nonsense. Letting the firing go into effect is kinda par for the course. Slaughter isn't suffering any meaningful harm in the interim, and blocking her firing would have been seen as the Court taking sides without hearing the merits. I wouldn't read their allowance of the firing to be an indication of how they plan to rule.

It's also possible that there's some 4D action going on here. Fire her, use the vacuum to get some short-term gains, lose in Court, and establish precedence in anticipation of future Democrats being the scumbags they constantly are to prevent them from doing the same. I, for one, don't give Donnie T enough credit for that - but he's got himself a pretty wily team this year as opposed to his first term.

This term, the big defining story is presidential power. This means that the big questions heading into the term are whether the Supreme Court will largely defer to Trump's executive assertions, or whether the Court will act as a check on at least some parts of Trump's agenda, such as by striking down his tariffs.

Stop making it about Trump. That's your partisanship and bias at work.

Replace his name with "The Executive Office." Because how they rule on these things is going to impact the would-be dictators on the left way worse than it will on Orange Man Bad.

It kinda makes me wish Trump came before Obama - for no reason other than to cut that prick off at the crotch before he could do the damage that SOB did to this nation.