Supreme Court to hear major case on limiting the power of federal government
Source: CNN Politics
Washington CNN The Supreme Court agreed Monday to reconsider long held precedent and decide whether to significantly scale back on the power of federal agencies in a case that can impact everything from how the government addresses everything from climate change to public health to immigration.
Conservative justices have long sought to rein in regulatory authority, arguing that Washington has too much control over American businesses and individual lives. The justices have been incrementally diminishing federal power but the new case would allow them to take a much broader stride.
The justices announced they would take up an appeal from herring fishermen in the Atlantic who say the National Marine Fisheries Service does not have the authority to require them to pay the salaries of government monitors who ride aboard the fishing vessels. Their action means they will reconsider a 1984 case Chevron v. Natural Resources Defense Council that sets forward factors to determine when courts should defer to a government agencys interpretation of the law.
Conservatives on the bench have cast a skeptical eye on the so-called Chevron deference, arguing that agencies are often too insulated from the usual checks and balances essential to the separation of powers. The idea that agencies should be allowed to resolve ambiguities in statutes that they enforce has been a central feature of modern administrative law, said Steve Vladeck, CNN Supreme Court analyst and professor at the University of Texas School of Law.
Read more: https://www.cnn.com/2023/05/01/politics/supreme-court-chevron-deference-conservatives-power-of-agencies/index.html
Full headline: Supreme Court to hear major case on limiting the power of federal government, a long-term goal of legal conservatives
As a note, there are agencies like the FDA, who set up and have successfully deployed "User Fees" for regulated industry over the past 30 years, to help to fund the review of applications for approval and some post-market monitoring of multiple covered products - i.e., drugs (new prescription and generics), medical devices, etc. I believe the fee is based on how many FTEs (Full Time Equivalents) are required for the review. It appears that if the extremist SCOTUS ditches that idea, a different regulatory structure that was always critically underfunded prior to enacting those fees (and not related to fisheries), could collapse. I'm not versed on the fisheries situation so don't know what the original law was for that.
Of course it is Congress (Legislative Branch) that creates these laws, not the Executive Branch.
PortTack
(35,820 posts)Zilli
(286 posts)to diminish We The People and our rights, our voice, our needs and our lives, they will do with GLEE.
hadEnuf
(3,616 posts)It's a tyranny of the minority. We need to squash these bugs.
edhopper
(37,370 posts)I wonder if I will still be here when this nation fails.
The clock is ticking.
sinkingfeeling
(57,835 posts)not fooled
(6,680 posts)Chaos will ensue but billionaires will be able to poison and cheat us at will, so all good.
I'm applying for a visa to emigrate. Had enough and it's only going to get worse.
p.s. my idiot MAGA neighbors, who have been heavily propagandized to believe "government can't do anything right," will think this is great news (except that, being low information, they don't understand how or why this decision will happen). Catastrophically ignorant. Gaaahhhh.
Oh, and this is the most important reason for the billionaires to buy the sc. They don't care about gunz or social issues other than as means to keep the proles fighting amongst themselves. Getting rid of taxes and regulations is the real motivation for these sociopaths.
mahatmakanejeeves
(69,854 posts)Hat tip, Joe.My.God.
May 1, 2023 News, Politics
Supreme Court accepts case that challenges authority of federal agencies
Conservatives have long wanted to overturn the precedent known as the Chevron doctrine
By Robert Barnes
May 1, 2023 at 11:05 a.m. EDT
The Supreme Court on Monday said it would take up a case that could do away with a decades-old precedent that tells judges to defer to federal agencies when interpreting ambiguous federal laws, a deference long targeted by conservatives concerned about the power of the administrative state. ... As the Supreme Court has become more conservative, the justices have grown less likely to defer to federal agencies under the 1984 precedent in Chevron U.S.A. v. Natural Resources Defense Council. But lower courts are bound to rely on the precedent because the Supreme Court has never officially renounced it.
A split panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit used the Chevron doctrine in deciding the case the Supreme Court added to its docket Monday: whether the government can force herring fishermen off the coast of New England to fund a program that provides federal monitors for their operations. The program is overseen by the National Marine Fisheries Service.
Two fishing companies told the court in their petition that the Magnuson-Stevens Act requires vessel owners to make room on board for federal monitors, without requiring the owners to pay those monitors. ... But without any express statutory authorization, the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) has decided to go one very large step further and require petitioners to pay the salaries of government-mandated monitors who take up valuable space on their vessels and oversee their operations, the petitions state.
{snip}
By Robert Barnes
Robert Barnes has been a Washington Post reporter and editor since 1987. He joined The Post to cover Maryland politics, and he has served in various editing positions, including metropolitan editor and national political editor. He has covered the Supreme Court since November 2006. Twitter https://twitter.com/scotusreporter
The Mouth
(3,414 posts)BumRushDaShow
(169,761 posts)And people wonder why bills are literally thousands of pages long while the GOP enjoys strolling down the aisles of a congressional chamber pushing a cart with a printed stack of pages from a particular bill.
The old "implied" vs "expressed" power debate.
mahatmakanejeeves
(69,854 posts)Docket No. Op. Below Argument Opinion Vote Author Term
22-451 D.C. Cir. TBD TBD TBD TBD OT 2023
Issue: (1) Whether the court should overrule Chevron v. Natl Resources Defense Council, or at least clarify that statutory silence concerning controversial powers expressly but narrowly granted elsewhere in the statute does not constitute an ambiguity requiring deference to the agency.
SCOTUSblog Coverage
Supreme Court will consider major case on power of federal regulatory agencies (Amy Howe, May 1, 2023)
....
Can fishermen be required to pay for federal monitors? And by the way should Chevron be overruled? (John Elwood, March 30, 2023)
{snip}
hueymahl
(2,904 posts)Or even a partisan, liberal vs. conservative issue. There are many persuasive liberal arguments that he power of federal agencies to make interpretations of the law is too great. In fact, many of us have complained mightily during republican administrations that the executive branch has too much power and can control regulators too much.
Personally, I would like to see more checks and balances.
BumRushDaShow
(169,761 posts)regarding "implied" vs "expressed" powers/authorities. And this is why you see some bills so long and convoluted because they often have to spell out every detail to stave off stuff like this. In this case, it sounds like what is usually dubbed "an unfunded mandate".
This particular case is also different from the types of "interpretations" that you are talking about that deal with "policy differences" and actually focuses on the ability to carry out their missions authorized by Congress, with little or no resources.
I know as a now-retired fed, during my 30+ years, I heard a litany of "do more with less", then "do more with nothing', then "do more with cuts". This is why there are agencies looking at and going more and more with "fee for service" schemas (which would now obviously need to explicitly be spelled out in legislation). That way the industries they regulate are paying the cost for certain regulatory oversight and not the taxpayer.
E.g., this was one of the ways that FDA handled it 30 years ago -
H.R.6181 - To amend the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act to authorize human drug application, prescription drug establishment, and prescription drug product fees and for other purposes. 102nd Congress (1991-1992)
The concept was then applied to other regulated product types.
pfitz59
(12,704 posts)SCrOTUS has clearly signaled its bias.
Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin
(135,731 posts)And they're butthurt that most don't like them.
Sibelius Fan
(24,808 posts)onetexan
(13,913 posts)in2herbs
(4,390 posts)conclusion --- meaning they'll wring their hands but take no action as our democracy is stolen.
Move the USSC headquarters to the far northern reaches of Alaska!!! In this age of technology the hearings can be on line. The Constitution does not required it to be in DC. If the justices don't want to move they can quit or retire. Then maybe Biden will finally expand the court.
The Constitution does not prohibit the USSC from having branches. Establish a branch of the USSC on the West Coast, one in the Midwest, and, if not Alaska, leave it in DC. Biden can expand the court in this way.
I honestly don't think our Congresscritters grasp the gravity of the situation we are in.