ABSTRACT
Beginning shortly after the Second World War, the status of the treaty power became the topic of a complex and continuing national debate. The treaty power itself is anomalous for constitutional government, and this is why it cannot be tied down firmly with constitutional words. Several Supreme Court decisions from the period between the first two world wars, less noticed at the time they were handed down than during the past decade, have made it more difficult to obscure the peculiar status of the treaty power. The congressional share in the treaty power has been so much reduced that what remains of it is largely by presidential grace. The treaty power has thus become one of the most effective and flexible instruments for accomplishing political aims, particularly those aims that entail marked and rapid changes from traditional procedures in the direction of centralization, statism and executive supremacy.
