Church and Spiegal: The Legislative Sequel

Abstract

As the court of last resort, the Supreme Court may be thought by some to be the "court of ultimate conjecture and final error." But in tax--as in most other-questions, it is Congress which is supreme. It can correct the Supreme Court's errors or perpetuate them. And just as surely, Congress can see that the Supreme Court does not have the last word even when that word was a correct answer to a legislative question. In October of 1949, Congress exercised its prerogative of overruling the Supreme Court by adding a legislative sequel to the Church and Spiegel cases, which had been decided nine months earlier. A bizarre story of two decades of legislative-judicial rivalry was thus brought to a close.