It empowers the President as the primary negotiator of agreements between the United States and other countries, and holds that the advice and consent of a two-thirds supermajority of the Senate renders a treaty binding with the force of federal law.
The unicameral Congress of the Confederation was the sole national governing body, with both legislative and executive functions, including the power to make treaties.
However, to take effect, treaties needed the approval of a supermajority of states (nine out of thirteen), a high bar that prevented many foreign pacts from being made.
During the Convention, it was initially contemplated that the U.S. Senate, the newly proposed upper house of Congress, would have the power to make treaties (as well as to appoint ambassadors and judges of the Supreme Court).
[5] Many delegates cited the established international tradition of executives holding exclusive power over foreign relations and agreements; the participation of the Senate through the "advice and consent" mechanism was added as something of a compromise.
Leading federalists like John Jay, James Madison, and Alexander Hamilton all supported this arrangement, particularly the amount of agency given to the President relative to the Senate.
However, the idea was widely rejected, due to the fact that the House was a much larger body than the Senate, and thus would be less likely to act decisively or keep certain sensitive agreements secret.
Federal statutes and treaties are similarly regarded as the "supreme law of the land" per the Supremacy Clause of the U.S. Constitution, with "no superior efficacy ... given to either over the other".
[21] The court ruled that treaties, even if otherwise constituting an international obligation, do not automatically have the force of domestic law unless they are explicitly "self-executing" in the text or implemented by an act of Congress.
The Medellin decision likewise limited the President's ability to unilaterally enforce an international agreement without the explicit delegation of Congress.
[23] Some legal scholars have read this provision as permitting "a class of less-important international agreements" that did not warrant the Treaty Clause procedure.
[31] James Madison contended that Congress had the constitutional right and duty to modify or repeal treaties based on its own determination of what is expedient for the national interest.
[33] The court has also maintained that the judiciary "have nothing to do and can give no redress" with respect to the international consequences and controversies arising from such Congressional action, since it is a political question beyond judicial review.
[34] This principle was most clearly established in the 1957 case Reid v. Covert, which held that "no agreement with a foreign nation can confer power on the Congress, or on any other branch of Government, which is free from the restraints of the Constitution".
[39] President George W. Bush unilaterally withdrew the United States from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty in 2002, six months after giving the required notice of intent,[40] but faced no judicial interference nor legal action.
Theodore Roosevelt, whose administration had a robust foreign policy, argued that ratification was necessary where an international accord would bind subsequent governments: The Constitution did not explicitly give me power to bring about the necessary agreement with Santo Domingo.