ABSTRACT
The political-question doctrine permits the US Supreme Court to avoid deciding cases that involve political issues more appropriately resolved by the political branches of government. The Court has also ignored the political-question doctrine if there were no judicial standards to resolve a case or it involved the constitutional exercise of congressional and presidential power. The Court even extended the doctrine to legislative apportionment in Colegrove v. Green, 328 US 549, which involved a challenge to malapportioned Illinois congressional districts. The Supreme Court turned to the exercise of executive power in United States v. Nixon, 418 US 683, to consider President Richard Nixon's refusal to supply tape recordings requested by the special prosecutor investigating the Watergate scandal. As one of the Court's self-crafted restrictions on its jurisdiction, the doctrine permits the Supreme Court to avoid political controversies that lack manageable judicial standards and that the Constitution has clearly committed to Congress and the president.
