XPost: alt.fan.rush-limbaugh, alt.politics.democrats, law.court.federal   
   XPost: sac.politics   
   From: biden.greed@nytimes.com   
      
   On 21 Aug 2021, "Text-Drivers R Killers"  posted   
   some news:sfr9g6$vlk$15@news.dns-netz.com:   
      
   > Public servants do not write laws.  They write guidance that does not   
   > run afoul of laws.  Otherwise they are going to get their asses sued.   
      
   What if I told you the Supreme Court often does too little, not too   
   much? That accusation usually comes from liberals who see the judiciary   
   as philosopher-kings enacting social justice over and against the will   
   of a bigoted public. But a conservative case exists for making the same   
   accusation, just on different grounds. For the Right, the court has   
   abdicated too much of its power to the administrative state, letting its   
   interpretations of law function over and above the justices’   
   constitutional power.   
      
   That abdication may be ending. On Monday, the justices added to their   
   docket Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo. The case concerns   
   commercial fishing companies that object to a rule promulgated by the   
   National Marine Fisheries Service. Under the rule, fishing companies   
   must pay the monitors legally required to observe these companies and   
   make sure they are in compliance with federal regulations. The fishing   
   companies argue the agency does not have the authority to make the   
   regulation.   
      
   AN ATTACK ON THE SUPREME COURT’S LEGITIMACY   
      
   That all might seem rather mundane, even boring, to anyone not involved   
   in the lawsuit. However, to decide the case, the court might strike hard   
   at the administrative state, having agreed to reconsider one of the most   
   important administrative law cases on record — Chevron v. Natural   
   Resources Defense Council.   
      
   That 1984 decision has been at the heart of the judicial abdication to   
   government agencies. It concerned what courts should do when a law   
   appears ambiguous in its meaning about a particular matter. In response,   
   it established what is known as “Chevron Deference.” The doctrine   
   requires courts to defer in those ambiguous instances to government   
   agencies and allow the bureaucracy to interpret the statute so long as   
   the interpretation is “reasonable.”   
      
   This deference has created many problems, including stripping the courts   
   of the judicial power to which they have a constitutional right. While   
   courts often find statutes vague, judges have nearly never found agency   
   regulations unreasonable. Thus, most binding interpretations of   
   congressional laws end up coming from the administrators. “Rather than   
   say what the law is,” Justice Gorsuch recently complained regarding   
   Chevron, “we tell those who come before us to go ask a bureaucrat.”   
      
   This is part of a broader, deeper problem. Contrary to our   
   constitutional structure, bureaucrats are able to circumvent the   
   separation of powers and combine the powers the Constitution separates:   
   making regulations, enforcing them, and adjudicating disputes regarding   
   them. They defend their legitimacy under the banner of “expertise,”   
   claiming to know better how to make, enforce, and interpret policy than   
   the average judge, congressman, president, or voter.   
      
   The other constitutional branches have gone along with this fundamental   
   reordering of our political structure as well. Congress has delegated   
   its legislative power to these agencies through broad, vague laws that   
   leave to the bureaucrats most decision-making. And the presidency has   
   permitted independent agencies to operate outside that office’s duty to   
   ensure proper law enforcement. Together, the three constitutional   
   branches have created and bowed to a monster unknown to our governing   
   document. Chevron Deference, therefore, helps to feed a governmental   
   structure at once more inept at its job and at the same time more prone   
   to tyrannical impulses attending insufficiently limited power.   
      
   Many outside the court have called for Chevron’s demise. It is a   
   frequent theme of panels for the Federalist Society, for example. Past   
   litigants before the court have tried to get it to reconsider Chevron   
   for years.   
      
   Within the court, several justices have critiqued Chevron and signaled   
   their willingness to curtail, if not overturn, the important precedent.   
   Some decisions, including last year’s West Virginia v. EPA, even have   
   implicitly limited the doctrine’s scope. But this case marks the first   
   time the court will take on the substance of Chevron directly.   
      
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
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