Humphrey's Executor v. United States
| Humphrey's Executor v. United States | |
|---|---|
| Argued May 1, 1935 Decided May 27, 1935 | |
| Full case name | Humphrey's Executor v. United States Rathbun, Executor v. United States |
| Citations | 295 U.S. 602 (more) 55 S. Ct. 869; 79 L. Ed. 1611; 1935 U.S. LEXIS 1089 |
| Holding | |
| Congress may create quasi-legislative or quasi-judicial agencies that are independent of executive control. The legislative intent of the Federal Trade Commission Act's for-cause removal provision was to limit the President's removal power. Shurtleff distinguished, Myers limited. | |
| Court membership | |
| |
| Case opinion | |
| Majority | Sutherland, joined by unanimous |
| Laws applied | |
| U.S. Const. art. I; U.S. Const. art. II; Federal Trade Commission Act | |
Humphrey's Executor v. United States, 295 U.S. 602 (1935), was a landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision that ruled that the U.S. Congress may limit the President's power to remove certain executive officials. The Court ruled that the U.S. Constitution allows Congress to restrict the President's authority to dismiss the leaders of independent agencies that are "quasi-legislative" or "quasi-judicial" in nature.
The case stemmed from President Franklin D. Roosevelt's 1933 dismissal of William E. Humphrey as a commissioner of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). Roosevelt had fired Humphrey over their policy disagreements involving economic regulation and the New Deal, despite the Federal Trade Commission Act of 1914 providing the President the power to remove an FTC commissioner only for "inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance in office." The Court unanimously held that this limitation on the President's authority to remove FTC commissioners was constitutional, and that Humphrey's dismissal had therefore been unlawful.
Over the course of the 20th century, Humphrey's Executor came to be viewed as the canonical precedent for the constitutionality of independent agencies in the U.S. federal government. The decision received criticism from some scholars during the latter part of the 20th century who claimed it unconstitutionally limits the powers of the president. The conservative majority Roberts Court has applied the decision by limiting the structural choices Congress may make when designing agencies. During the second Donald Trump presidency, several controversial firings of independent-agency executive officials spawned lawsuits challenging the ongoing validity of Humphrey's Executor. The Supreme Court heard oral arguments in one of these cases, Trump v. Slaughter, in December 2025.