The line-item veto, also called the partial veto, is a special form of
veto power
A veto is a legal power to unilaterally stop an official action. In the most typical case, a president or monarch vetoes a bill to stop it from becoming law. In many countries, veto powers are established in the country's constitution. Veto pow ...
that authorizes a chief executive to reject particular provisions of a bill enacted by a legislature without vetoing the entire bill. Many countries have different standards for invoking the line-item veto if it exists at all. Each country or state has its own particular requirement for overriding a line-item veto.
Countries allowing line-item veto
Brazil
The
President of Brazil
The president of Brazil ( pt, Presidente do Brasil), officially the president of the Federative Republic of Brazil ( pt, Presidente da República Federativa do Brasil) or simply the ''President of the Republic'', is the head of state and head o ...
has the power of the line-item veto over all legislation (art. 84 Federal Constitution of 1988: "The President of the Republic has the exclusive powers to: (...) V.veto bills, either in whole or in part"). Any provisions vetoed in such a manner are returned to the Brazilian congress and can be overridden by a vote (art. 66 of the Federal Constitution). An example of this came in August 2012, when Dilma Rousseff vetoed portions of a new forestry law which had been criticized as potentially causing another wave of
deforestation in the Amazon Rainforest.
Panama
The
President of Panama has the ability to partially veto portions of a bill.
Philippines
Article VI, Section 27 (2) of the
Constitution of the Philippines says "The President shall have the power to veto any particular item or items in an appropriation, revenue, or tariff bill, but the veto shall not affect the item or items to which he does not object."
United States
Federal government
Dating to before the
American Civil War
The American Civil War (April 12, 1861 – May 26, 1865; also known by other names) was a civil war in the United States. It was fought between the Union ("the North") and the Confederacy ("the South"), the latter formed by states ...
, U.S. Presidents including
Ulysses S. Grant and
Ronald Reagan have sought line-item veto powers. It was not until the
presidency of Bill Clinton that Congress passed such legislation.
Intended to control "
pork barrel spending", the
Line Item Veto Act of 1996
The Line Item Veto Act was a federal law of the United States that granted the President the power to line-item veto budget bills passed by Congress, but its effect was brief as the act was soon ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in '' ...
was held to be unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court in a 1998 ruling in ''
Clinton v. City of New York''. The court affirmed a lower court decision that the line-item veto was equivalent to the unilateral amendment or repeal of only parts of statutes and therefore violated the
Presentment Clause
The Presentment Clause (Article I, Section 7, Clauses 2 and 3) of the United States Constitution outlines federal government of the United States, federal Legislation, legislative procedure by which Bill (proposed law), bills originating in Uni ...
of the
United States Constitution. Before the ruling, President Clinton applied the line-item veto to the federal budget 82 times.
Since then, the prospect of granting the President of the United States a line-item veto has occasionally resurfaced in Congress, either through a constitutional amendment or a differently worded bill. Most recently, the
U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill on February 8, 2012, that would have granted the President a limited line-item veto; however, the bill was not heard in the
U.S. Senate.
The most-commonly proposed form of the line-item veto is limited to partial vetoes of spending bills.
Confederate States of America
While the
Constitution of the Confederate States was largely based on the U.S. Constitution, one of the most notable departures was the granting of a line-item veto to its president.
Jefferson Davis, however, never exercised the provision.
State governments
Forty-three states—all except
Indiana
Indiana () is a U.S. state in the Midwestern United States. It is the 38th-largest by area and the 17th-most populous of the 50 States. Its capital and largest city is Indianapolis. Indiana was admitted to the United States as the 19th s ...
,
Maryland
Maryland ( ) is a state in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It shares borders with Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware and the Atlantic Ocean to ...
,
Nevada
Nevada ( ; ) is a state in the Western region of the United States. It is bordered by Oregon to the northwest, Idaho to the northeast, California to the west, Arizona to the southeast, and Utah to the east. Nevada is the 7th-most extensive, ...
,
New Hampshire
New Hampshire is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States. It is bordered by Massachusetts to the south, Vermont to the west, Maine and the Gulf of Maine to the east, and the Canadian province of Quebec to the nor ...
,
North Carolina
North Carolina () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States. The state is the 28th largest and 9th-most populous of the United States. It is bordered by Virginia to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the east, Georgia and ...
,
Rhode Island
Rhode Island (, like ''road'') is a state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It is the smallest U.S. state by area and the seventh-least populous, with slightly fewer than 1.1 million residents as of 2020, but it ...
and
Vermont
Vermont () is a state in the northeast New England region of the United States. Vermont is bordered by the states of Massachusetts to the south, New Hampshire to the east, and New York to the west, and the Canadian province of Quebec to ...
—give their governors some form of line-item veto power. The
Mayor of Washington, D.C. also has this power.
District of Columbia Home Rule Act
The District of Columbia Home Rule Act is a United States federal law passed on December 24, 1973, which devolved certain congressional powers of the District of Columbia to local government, furthering District of Columbia home rule. In par ...
()
Uruguay
Articles 137 and 138 of the
Constitution of Uruguay
The Constitution of Uruguay () is the supreme law of Uruguay. Its first version was written in 1830 and its last amendment was made in 2004.
Uruguay's first constitution was adopted in 1830, following the conclusion of the three-year-long Cispla ...
allow the executive power to exercise total or partial vetoes of any bill by the Parliament.
References
{{Authority control
Veto
Legislative legal terminology