This morning, in a 6-3 decision, the Supreme Court overturned a 40 year-old legal precedent known as Chevron deference, the rule which has empowered unelected bureaucrats working for large three-letter government agencies to make laws governing American industry.
The impact of this decision cannot be overstated. It’s a swampbusting ruling that will dramatically shrink the sprawling, bloated power of an executive branch that has reached Leviathan levels since Chevron was enacted.
What Is Chevron?
The 1984 Chevron Doctrine was the product of another Supreme Court case, Chevron v. Natural Resources Defense Council, in which justices chose to defer to federal agencies when interpreting laws passed by Congress.
This rule has taken power and responsibility away from Congress and given undue power to the president, who administers federal administrative agencies and appointments, violating the separation of powers doctrine.
Chevron also took away the right of courts to interpret the law, instead allocating career bureaucrats enormous power to determine their own parameters of power and to dictate laws themselves.
In short: For 40 years, Chevron empowered unelected “experts” to write the rules that impact American industry and agriculture, creating the modern massive bureaucratic state we see today.
What are the details of the case that ended Chevron?
In a pair of decisions, Relentless v. Dept. of Commerce and Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, the current court ended this precedent and returned proper power back to the legislative and judicial branches of government in lawmaking.
Both cases were brought by a group of fisherman over a regulation from the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) that required them to pay for government observers to board their ships and watch their fishing practices.
There is a governing statute which says the NMFS may require federal observers, but there is no ruling that fishermen must pay the observers personally.
Federal “experts” decided unilaterally that the law should be interpreted this way, forcing fishermen to pay the salaries of their own watchdogs.
The Supreme Court overturned lower courts who upheld the rule based on Chevron deference, with the six conservative-appointed justices on the court taking initiative to end Chevron entirely.
How will today’s decision impact industry and agriculture?
Ending the Chevron Doctrine means a better distribution of power between the three branches of government. Congress (the legislative branch) will now legislate on issues that impact Americans. If those laws are unclear, it will be up to the courts (the judicial branch) to interpret their meaning. The president (the executive branch), and the federal agencies he manages through presidential appointment, will be tasked with administering the law.
Legal experts predict major implications for American agriculture and industry, from start-ups to farm subsidies to environmental practices.
For farmers and ranchers specifically, the agencies that impact agriculture, from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to the Army Corps of Engineers, will no longer be able to imperially make laws that affect the American people without Congressional authorization. Impacts are wide-ranging, from the Clean Water Act to WOTUS and more.
“Our elected officials in Congress should be making our laws, not unelected bureaucrats at federal agencies,” said Mark Eisele, a Wyoming cattle rancher and president of the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA), in a statement. “Cattle producers have experienced numerous instances of federal agencies enacting overreaching regulations on our farms and ranches, exceeding their authority granted by Congress. I am glad the Supreme Court is reining in these federal agencies and putting power back in the hands of those elected to represent us in Washington.”
Mary-Thomas Hart, chief counsel for the organization, added that the ruling “will impact almost every regulation that NCBA has worked on.”
Roger McEowen of the Washburn School of Law told RFD-TV today that this ruling is a “huge win for agriculture.”
