The political question doctrines: 'Zivotofsky v. Clinton' and getting beyond the textual-prudential paradigm

Since the Supreme Court's opinion in 'Baker v. Carr', the political question doctrine has been viewed as consisting of textual and prudential factors. How these interrelate, and which type of factors to favor if these clash, has led to considerable confusion. In the recent case of 'Zivotofsky' ex rel. 'Zivotofsky v. Clinton', Chief Justice Roberts may have attempted to settle these concerns by ignoring prudential factors altogether, characterizing political questions as concerned only with textual constraints. This Note argues that a simple textual-prudential understanding of the political question doctrine is incomplete. In surveying all thirty-eight Supreme Court cases involving the political question doctrine since 'Baker' was decided, it becomes clear that four competing conceptions of the political question doctrine have actually been formulated. Regardless of political question's future, only by recognizing these competing conceptions can one make sense of the doctrine up to and through 'Zivotofsky'.