ment if they can straightway remerge on their
own motion? The second is the concept of due process of law, which
precludes the transfer of regulatory functions to private persons.
Lastly, there is the maxim of agency "_Delegata potestas non potest
delegari_," which John Locke borrowed and formulated as a dogma of
political science.[19] In Hampton Jr. & Co. _v._ United States,[20]
Chief Justice Taft offered the following explanation of the origin and
limitations of this idea as a postulate of constitutional law: "The
well-known maxim '_Delegata potestas non potest delegari_,' applicable
to the law of agency in the general and common law, is well understood
and has had wider application in the construction of our Federal and
State Constitutions than it has in private law. The Federal Constitution
and State Constitutions of this country divide the governmental power
into three branches. * * * in carrying out that constitutional division
* * * it is a breach of the National fundamental law if Congress gives
up its legislative power and transfers it to the President, or to the
Judicial branch, or if by law it attempts to invest itself or its
members with either executive power or judicial power. This is not to
say that the three branches are not co-ordinate parts of one government
and that each in the field of its duties may not invoke the action of
the two other branches in so far as the action invoked shall not be an
assumption of the constitutional field of action of another branch. In
determining what it may do in seeking assistance from another branch,
the extent and character of that assistance must be fixed according to
common sense and the inherent necessities of the governmental
co-ordination."[21]

FUNCTIONS WHICH MAY BE DELEGATED

Yielding to "common sense and the inherent necessities of governmental
co-ordination" the Court has sustained numerous statutes granting in the
total vast powers to administrative or executive agencies. Two different
theories, both enunciated during the Chief Justiceship of John Marshall,
have been utilized to justify these results. First in importance is the
theory that another department may be empowered to "fill up the details"
of a statute.[22] The second is that Congress may legislate
contingently, leaving to others the task of ascertaining the facts which
bring its declared policy into operation.[23]

POWER TO SUPPLEMENT STATUTORY PROVISIONS

The pioneer case which recogniz