The judge says that Trump has the power to impose prices, but has brought to justice in various courts

Donald Trump’s radical rates could survive a legal challenge, thanks in part to a Japanese zip closings company which continued the Nixon administration 50 years ago.

Earlier this week, a federal judge in Florida appointed by Donald Trump suggested that the president had the power to unilaterally impose prices – based on his decision on the preceding of a judicial case of the 1970s – but ceased to make an order affirming the right of the president to impose radical tariffs.

In a largely technical decision published on Tuesday, US judge T. Kent Wetherell II transferred one of the first proceedings contesting Trump’s prices to a different federal court while weighing on the legality of controversial rates. The planned company based in Florida, Emily Ley Paper, continued the prices in April, asking Wetherell to invalidate them because Trump does not have the power to impose the prices itself.

According to the judge, the International Emergency Economic Powers Act of 1977 gives Trump the authority to set prices for reasons other than the increase in income. Wetherell wrote that Trump’s justification for prices – both stimulating the flow of illicit drugs in the country and resolving a commercial imbalance – is sufficient to satisfy the terms set by the congress.

“This is a civil action that has started against the United States and” follows from a “federal law – ieepa – therefore the question arranged by the documents of the parties is whether ieepa”[es] For … prices, “he wrote.” The defendants argue that this is the case; The applicants argue that not. The court agrees with the defendants … “

The decision is at best a symbolic victory for the Trump administration, which repels half a dozen legal proceedings contesting the legality of the recent prices of the “Liberation Day”.

Judge Wotherell finally decided to transfer the case from a Florida Federal Court to the New York International Trade Court, which means that, despite his favorable vision of the prices, he will not be the only one to decide the case.

But the decision marks the first time that a federal judge suggested that the taxation of prices by Trump is a matter of his authority as president, offering a positive sign that the Trump administration could find a receptive audience for the International Trade Court. During two hearings in last week, judges of the International Trade Court fought with the same question on the authority of Trump.

The question comes down to the interpretation of the law of the 1970s that Trump used to impose his prices. The ieepa gives the president the right to “regulate” imports but does not explicitly mention the prices. The lawyers contesting the prices argued that the interpretation by Trump of the law exceeds its authority by browsing a problem controlled by the congress, but the Trump administration underlined the judges of a court decision linked to the legal predecessor of the IEEPA – Trade with the enemy law of 1917 – to guide the way.

At the time when President Richard Nixon confronted the country’s 1971 economic crisis with steep prices on Japanese products, a Japanese -based zippers called Yoshida continued Nixon on prices.

The Customs Court and Patent Calls, the predecessor of the Court of International Trade, has stored on the government side and judged that the Twa gives the President the power to impose prices.

According to Wetherell, the same reasoning would apply 50 years later at the IEPA, which means that Trump has the power to impose prices without the help of the Congress. “The reasoning in Yoshida is convincing, and the Court sees no reason why it does not apply to the ieepa because the operating language of the ieepa is identical to the operating language of Twea,” wrote the judge.

Despite the loss of its legal battle, Yoshida remains in business today. Now operating under the name of YKK, it produces more zippers than any other company in the world.