Tuesday, June 25, 2019

Tugging at the Reins of the Administrative State

At first blush, last week's Supreme Court decision in Gundy v. United States was unexceptional: five of eight justices participating in the case voted with the government to uphold an unsympathetic criminal's conviction.

In 1892, in Field v. Clark, the Supreme Court declared: "That Congress cannot delegate legislative power to the is a principle universally recognized as vital to the integrity and maintenance of the system of government ordained by the Constitution."

In a pair of 1935 cases, Panama Refining Company v. Ryan and A.L.A. Schechter Poultry Corporation v. United States, the Supreme Court struck down those portions of the law.

In an erudite 33-page dissent in Gundy, Justice Neil Gorsuch-writing for himself, Chief Justice John Roberts, and Justice Clarence Thomas-sketched out how the Court has continued to enforce some form of non-delegation doctrine, albeit under other names.

Chief among these is the "Major questions" doctrine, which prevents administrative agencies from filling in "Statutory gaps" when those gaps center on "a question of deep 'economic and political significance.'" The Supreme Court has stepped in, in recent decades, to block executive-branch efforts to regulate cigarettes or greenhouse gases without clear congressional guidance.

A vague law "Impermissibly delegates basic policy matters to policemen, judges, and juries for resolution on an ad hoc and subjective basis," as the Supreme Court explained in a 1972 decision.

On the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, Kavanaugh was a consistent critic of broad delegations of authority by Congress.

https://www.city-journal.org/gundy-v-us-lawmaking-powers

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