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Excerpt from www.agri-pulse.com
A South Dakota farmer seeking review of a wetlands determination may be one of the first beneficiaries of the Supreme Court’s decision overruling the 40-year-old Chevron doctrine, which required courts to defer to agency expertise when laws passed by Congress are not explicit.
He’s not the only one. Following the June 28 decision, the court granted eight other petitions and remanded those cases to lower courts, including one about a National Labor Relations Board ruling. And in the wake of its decision in Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, a flurry of lawsuits already in the works were filed that seek to take advantage of the court’s decision.
Environmental and public health advocates warn of confusion in the federal courts – and at federal agencies – over how the limits of agency authority will be defined. They also say the new legal regime will force Congress to give agencies more specific direction in the laws it passes, a job that Congress, without the phalanx of scientists and technical experts that federal agencies have, is ill-equipped to handle. Lastly, they say the court’s decision gives judges – also not subject matter experts for every complicated case that comes before them – too much power.
