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.
Despite outrage from some, Congress reluctant to intervene on Supreme Court ethics
Two judges on a D.C. Circuit panel said the fisheries service was justified to interpret the statute as authorizing the payment program. But the third judge said his colleagues had mistaken silence in the statute for authority.
The decision “authorizes agencies to force the governed to quarter and pay for their regulatory overseers without clear congressional authorization,” said the companies’ petition. “And it perceives ambiguity in statutory silence, where the logical explanation for the statutory silence is that Congress did not intend to grant the agency such a dangerous and uncabined authority. Whether by clarifying Chevron or overruling it, this Court should grant review and reverse the clear agency overreach at issue here.”
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The Biden administration defended the fishing service and the Chevron doctrine. “Federal courts have invoked Chevron in thousands of reported decisions, and Congress has repeatedly legislated against its backdrop,” the government said in its brief. It said the doctrine “promotes political accountability, national uniformity, and predictability, and it respects the expertise agencies can bring to bear in administering complex statutory schemes.”
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, who served on the D.C. Circuit until last June, did not participate in the decision to take the case and, as is customary, did not say why she recused herself.
The court also said Monday that it would take a case focused on what financial whistleblowers must prove in retaliation lawsuits against their employers.
In other orders Monday, the court turned down a challenge to an Indiana law that requires the cremation or burial of embryonic or fetal remains following an abortion. There were no noted dissents to the decision not to review the law.
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.
Despite outrage from some, Congress reluctant to intervene on Supreme Court ethics
Two judges on a D.C. Circuit panel said the fisheries service was justified to interpret the statute as authorizing the payment program. But the third judge said his colleagues had mistaken silence in the statute for authority.
The decision “authorizes agencies to force the governed to quarter and pay for their regulatory overseers without clear congressional authorization,” said the companies’ petition. “And it perceives ambiguity in statutory silence, where the logical explanation for the statutory silence is that Congress did not intend to grant the agency such a dangerous and uncabined authority. Whether by clarifying Chevron or overruling it, this Court should grant review and reverse the clear agency overreach at issue here.”
ADVERTISING
The Biden administration defended the fishing service and the Chevron doctrine. “Federal courts have invoked Chevron in thousands of reported decisions, and Congress has repeatedly legislated against its backdrop,” the government said in its brief. It said the doctrine “promotes political accountability, national uniformity, and predictability, and it respects the expertise agencies can bring to bear in administering complex statutory schemes.”
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, who served on the D.C. Circuit until last June, did not participate in the decision to take the case and, as is customary, did not say why she recused herself.
The court also said Monday that it would take a case focused on what financial whistleblowers must prove in retaliation lawsuits against their employers.
In other orders Monday, the court turned down a challenge to an Indiana law that requires the cremation or burial of embryonic or fetal remains following an abortion. There were no noted dissents to the decision not to review the law.
