“After the tariff rebuke: How India should recalibrate its US strategy”, First Post, February 23, 2026
“The United States Supreme Court’s decision in Learning Resources v Trump has come as a respite for many countries. In substance, it is a constitutional reassertion of Congress’s primacy over trade taxation. One should read how Chief Justice John Roberts framed the issue: “We decide whether the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) authorises the President to impose tariffs.” The court’s answer is categorical: It does not.
The opinion proceeds from first principles. Article I, Section 8 vests in Congress the power to “lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises”. Tariffs, the court notes, are “very clear[ly]… a branch of the taxing power”. The government conceded that the President has “no inherent authority to impose tariffs during peacetime”. The entire defence of the tariff regime therefore rested on IEEPA’s grant of authority to “regulate… importation”.
The court rejects the proposition that the words “regulate” and “importation” can carry such weight. IEEPA, it emphasises, “contains no reference to tariffs or duties”. When Congress delegates tariff authority, it does so explicitly, using words such as “duty”, and it attaches limits on duration, scope, and process. By contrast, the administration’s reading would authorise the President to impose tariffs “of unlimited amount and duration, on any product from any country”, triggered by a presidential declaration of emergency. That, the court holds, is not a permissible inference from ambiguous text……”
Read full article at firstpost.com
