The Supreme Court of the United States has granted review of the case Loper Bright Enterprises vs. Raimondo. This case has the potential to gut the federal bureaucracy by overturning the Chevron doctrine.
The Chevron doctrine is a legal principle that requires courts to defer to the interpretation of a statute by an administrative agency if the statute is ambiguous. This doctrine has been used by federal agencies to expand their power far beyond what Congress intended.
In Loper Bright Enterprises, a group of commercial fishermen are challenging a regulation issued by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). The regulation requires fishermen to pay for the cost of monitoring their catch. The fishermen argue that the regulation is not authorized by Congress and that it exceeds NOAA’s authority.
The Supreme Court’s decision in this case could have a major impact on the federal bureaucracy. If the Court overturns the Chevron doctrine, it will make it much more difficult for federal agencies to expand their power. This would be a major victory for limited government and a step towards restoring the balance of power between the legislative and executive branches.
Lower courts have been bound by former Justice Stevens’ assertion that “reasonable interpretations” of statutes by administrative agencies are to not be overruled. In this case, the word “reasonable” has been stretched to absolute extremes, and that has allowed the bureaucratic state to reign supreme without any boundaries.
This is how the government can ban ATF bump stocks despite there being no actual statutory allowance for such a violation of personal freedom. It’s also how you get all of the environmental regulations, including literal puddles in backyards being hit with ridiculous, costly EPA enforcement. The federal government has been completely out of control for decades, and the Chevron Doctrine has been at the heart of many of the abuses.
Now there is a chance that the Supreme Court will overturn this doctrine, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson is already recused from the case, meaning that the conservative wing would only need to muster four votes.
…Here is the question: “whether the Court should overrule Chevron 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.”
— Jonathan Turley (@JonathanTurley) May 1, 2023