Coleman v. Miller

307 U.S. 433 (1939), argued 10 Oct. 1938, reargued 17–18 Apr. 1939, decided 5 June 1939 by vote of 7 to 2; Hughes for the Court, Butler and McReynolds in dissent. The Court faced three issues: (1) could the lieutenant governor of Kansas break a tie in the state senate in favor of the proposed Child Labor Amendment; (2) could the state ratify an amendment it had previously rejected; and (3) could a state ratify an amendment thirteen years after Congress proposed it with no time limit? The court was “equally divided” (p. 447) on the first issue and thus left standing the Kansas Supreme Court's judgment sanctioning the lieutenant governor's participation. Citing congressional promulgation of the Fourteenth Amendment, the Court held that the latter two issues were political questions for Congress to decide. Concurring Justices Hugo Black, Owen Roberts, Felix Frankfurter, and William Douglas wanted to entrust all amending issues to Congress. The dissenters, citing Dillon v. Gloss (1921), argued that Kansas's ratification was untimely. Addressing similar issues in the companion case, Chandler v. Wise, the majority dismissed an action against Kentucky's governor, declaring his certification of the state's ratification conclusive.

Coleman muddied the amending process and introduced the ambiguous precedent of the Fourteenth Amendment. Subsequent decisions concerning political questions could limit Coleman's reach. Thus, in Idaho v. Freeman (1981), a U.S. district court sanctioned a state's rescission of ratification of the proposed Equal Rights Amendment after Congress extended the amendment's original seven‐year deadline.

See also Constitutional Amending Process; Judicial Power and Jurisdiction; Political Questions.

— John R. Vile

Coleman v. Miller
Supreme Court of the United States
Argued October 10, 1938 Reargued April 17–April 18, 1939 Decided June 5, 1939
Full case name	Coleman, et al. v. Miller, Secretary of the Senate of State of Kansas, et al.
Citations	307 U.S. 433 (more) 59 S. Ct. 972; 83 L. Ed. 1385; 1939 U.S. LEXIS 1066; 1 Lab. Cas. (CCH) P17,046; 122 A.L.R. 695
Prior history	Cert. to the Supreme Court of Kansas
Holding
All amendments to the Federal Constitution are considered pending before the states indefinitely unless Congress establishes a deadline within which the states must act. Further, Congress—not the courts—is responsible for deciding if an amendment has been validly ratified.
Court membership
Chief Justice Associate Justices
Case opinions
Majority	Hughes, joined by Roberts, Black, Reed, Frankfurter, Douglas
Concurrence	Black, joined by Roberts, Frankfurter, Douglas
Concurrence	Frankfurter
Dissent	Butler, joined by McReynolds
Laws applied
U.S. Const. Art. V

Coleman v. Miller, 307 U.S. 433 (1939) is a landmark decision of the United States Supreme Court which clarified that if the Congress of the United States—when proposing for ratification an amendment to the United States Constitution pursuant to Article V thereof—chooses not to specify a deadline within which the state legislatures (or conventions held in the states) must act upon the proposed amendment, then the amendment remains pending business before the state legislatures (or conventions). The case centered around the Child Labor Amendment, which was proposed for ratification by Congress in 1924.

According to Coleman, it is none other than the Congress itself—if and when the Congress should later be presented with valid ratifications from the required number of states—which has the discretion to arbitrate the question of whether too much time has elapsed between Congress' initial proposal of the amendment and the most recent state ratification thereof assuming that, as a consequence of that most recent action, the legislatures of (or conventions conducted within) at least three-fourths of the states have approved the amendment at one time or another.

The Coleman ruling—which modified the 1921 finding in Dillon v. Gloss—formed the basis of the belated and unusual ratification of the 27th Amendment.

As of 2009, the Child labor amendment, Article the First, the Corwin Amendment and the Titles of Nobility Amendment are the only still, technically-pending constitutional amendments.

The Coleman decision has been described as the genesis of the political question doctrine which is sometimes espoused by federal courts in cases wherein the court deems the matter at hand to be properly assigned to the discretion of the legislative branch of the federal government.

See also

• Congressional Apportionment Amendment
• Corwin Amendment
• Titles of Nobility Amendment
• Political question doctrine
• List of United States Supreme Court cases, volume 307

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