820
Opinion of the Court
of the other two branches of the Federal Government was unconstitutional. See, e. g., Bender, supra, at 542; Valley Forge, supra, at 473-474. As we said in Allen, supra, at 752, "the law of Art. III standing is built on a single basic idea—the idea of separation of powers." In the light of this overriding and time-honored concern about keeping the Judiciary's power within its proper constitutional sphere,3 we
must put aside the natural urge to proceed directly to the merits of this important dispute and to "settle" it for the sake of convenience and efficiency. Instead, we must carefully inquire as to whether appellees have met their burden of establishing that their claimed injury is personal, particularized, concrete, and otherwise judicially cognizable.
III
We have never had occasion to rule on the question of legislative standing presented here.4 In Powell v. McCormack, 395 U. S. 486, 496, 512-514 (1969), we held that a Member of
3 It is settled that Congress cannot erase Article III's standing requirements by statutorily granting the right to sue to a plaintiff who would not otherwise have standing. Gladstone, Realtors v. Village of Bellwood, 441 U. S. 91, 100 (1979). We acknowledge, though, that Congress' decision to grant a particular plaintiff the right to challenge an Act's constitutionality (as here, see § 692(a)(1), supra, at 815-816) eliminates any prudential standing limitations and significantly lessens the risk of unwanted conflict with the Legislative Branch when that plaintiff brings suit. See, e. g., Bennett v. Spear, 520 U. S. 154, 164-166 (1997).
4 Over strong dissent, the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit has held that Members of Congress may have standing when (as here) they assert injury to their institutional power as legislators. See, e. g., Kennedy v. Sampson, 511 F. 2d 430, 435-436 (CADC 1974); Moore v. United States House of Representatives, 733 F. 2d 946, 951 (CADC 1984); id., at 956 (Scalia, J., concurring in result); Barnes v. Kline, 759 F. 2d 21, 28-29 (CADC 1985); id., at 41 (Bork, J., dissenting). But see Holtzman v. Schlesinger, 484 F. 2d 1307, 1315 (CA2 1973) (Member of Congress has no standing to challenge constitutionality of American military operations in Vietnam war); Harrington v. Schlesinger, 528 F. 2d 455, 459 (CA4 1975) (same).
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