In the case of Elder et al. v. Brannan, Secretary of Agriculture in 1950, a group of milk producers challenged the constitutionality of the Agricultural Marketing Agreement Act (AMAA) as it was applied to them by Charles F. Brannan, then-Secretary of Agriculture. The plaintiffs argued that their due process rights were violated because they did not have an opportunity for a hearing before being subjected to marketing orders under AMAA which set minimum prices for their products and limited where they could sell them. However, the Supreme Court upheld these provisions as constitutional on grounds that Congress had broad power to regulate interstate commerce and stabilize agricultural markets through such measures without necessarily providing hearings beforehand.

In the dissenting opinion for Elder et al. v. Brannan, Justice Robert H. Jackson argued that the majority's decision to uphold a federal price support program for milk producers was an unconstitutional delegation of legislative power to the executive branch. He contended that Congress had not provided clear standards or guidelines in its legislation and instead left it up to the Secretary of Agriculture to determine how much financial aid should be given out and who should receive it. This, he believed, violated separation of powers principles by allowing an unelected official in the executive branch too much discretion over public funds without sufficient oversight from elected representatives in Congress.