Supreme Court to rule on use of Jerusalem in U.S. passports
After years of litigation, the Supreme Court on Monday said it would rule on whether Congress or the State Department has the final say in whether U.S. passports acknowledge Jerusalem as part of Israel.
This touches on one of the most sensitive issues in decades of Middle East conflict, and the case also presents a major separation of power conflict between the legislative and executive branches.
The controversy is over a 2002 law passed by Congress regarding passports. It says that a U.S. citizen born in Jerusalem may request his or her birthplace to be listed as Israel. This was an attempt to nullify State Department instructions that only “Jerusalem” be listed, a recognition of the official U.S. policy of neutrality over national sovereignty of the holy city.
The directive was inserted into a broader spending bill that President George W. Bush signed, even as he announced his administration would not carry out Congress’s passport dictate. The Obama administration has adopted the same view: That Congress was intruding on the executive’s responsibility for making the nation’s foreign policy.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/supreme-court-to-rule-on-use-of-jerusalem-in-us-passports/2014/04/21/d18f042a-c985-11e3-93eb-6c0037dde2ad_story.html