LINCOLN, Neb. (DTN) -- The Supreme Court on Friday overturned a key legal doctrine on a 6-3 vote, giving new life to farmers like South Dakota's Arlen Foster who has been fighting the USDA for years on a wetlands determination.
The Administrative Procedure Act requires courts to exercise their judgment in deciding whether an agency has acted within its statutory authority.
Because of the decision, courts will no longer be able to defer to an agency interpretation of the law simply because a statute is ambiguous.
Chevron deference required that if statutory language is clear, agencies were required to follow the letter of the law. If wording and context in a statute is ambiguous, courts have been deferring to federal agencies' discretion.
In writing the opinion in Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, Chief Justice John Roberts said the Chevron doctrine "defies the command" of the Administrative Procedure Act, "that the reviewing court -- not the agency whose action it reviews -- is to decide all relevant questions of law and interpret statutory provisions. It requires a court to ignore, not follow, the reading the court would have reached had it exercised its independent judgment as required by the APA."
Roberts said Chevron's presumption that statutory ambiguities are implicit delegations of authority by Congress to federal agencies is "misguided because agencies have no special competence in resolving statutory ambiguities -- courts do."
In the opinion, Roberts said the court's decision does not "call into question prior cases that relied on the Chevron framework."
Justice Elena Kagan wrote the opinion for the dissent in the case. She said there's concern the court's action could create chaos when it comes to the implementation of many federal laws including the Clean Water Act, recent changes to the Packers and Stockyards Act and many others.
Kagan said Chevron had become "part of the warp and woof of modern government, supporting regulatory efforts of all kinds -- to name a few, keeping air and water clean, food and drugs safe and financial markets honest."
The Chevron doctrine, Kagan said, was built on the notion that "Congress knows that it does not- -- in fact cannot -- write perfectly complete regulatory statutes. It knows that those statutes will inevitably contain ambiguities that some other actor will have to resolve, and gaps that some other actor will have to fill. And it would usually prefer that actor to be the responsible agency, not a court."
Agriculture groups such as the Agricultural Retailers Association said the Chevron doctrine has been a key cog in federal agencies expanding their reach.
"For the past 40 years, the Chevron doctrine has provided an opportunity for federal regulatory agencies to expand their regulations beyond the intent of Congress," the group said in a press statement.
"If Congress was not specific in limiting an agency's authority in statute, Chevron provided deference to the agency in interpreting its own authorizing statute. This decision from the Supreme Court is important because it will require an agency to have specific statutory authority in order to submit private citizens or businesses to a regulatory requirement."
Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, said in a statement the court's decision was important.
"Today's decision restores appropriate balance to our nation's system of checks and balances," Grassley said.
"The Supreme Court has made clear that we are a nation governed by the rule of law, not by bureaucratic regulators. Congress will now be under extreme pressure to be more specific when writing legislation, so that a bill's plain text can be clearly interpreted by the courts and federal agencies when legislation becomes law. This decision brings enhanced accountability to Congress and the executive branch."
House Committee on Agriculture Chairman Glenn Thompson, R-Penn., said the court's decision restores the balance of power.
"In overturning the Chevron doctrine, the Supreme Court has taken a significant step in reaffirming a core principle of our constitution: the power to legislate rests with Congress," Thompson said.
"For too long, unelected and unaccountable bureaucrats have wielded unchecked power with wide-reaching implications."
FOSTER PETITION
Miner County, South Dakota, farmer Arlen Foster filed a petition with the Supreme Court last year asking for review of his wetlands determination case.
Foster's attorneys asked the court to consider overruling the Chevron deference established by the court in a 1984 ruling in Chevron USA v. Natural Resources Defense Council.
Foster appealed to the Supreme Court for a second time in August 2023. That came after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit rejected his claim that USDA's Natural Resources Conservation Service unjustly rejected his request for a review of a wetlands determination on an 0.8-acre tract of land.
Foster has been fighting the agency's determination for about 15 years.
Paige Gilliard, an attorney with the Pacific Legal Foundation, the firm representing Foster, said the hope is the Supreme Court will soon take action on Foster's petition.
"In our petition we asked the court for a GVR (grant, vacate, remand) in light of Loper Bright," Gilliard told DTN.
"If the court grants that they would send the case back to the Eighth Circuit for reconsideration. No word yet on whether we'll get a GVR; we expect the court to make a decision within the next week or so."
Food and Water Watch Executive Director Wenonah Hauter said the court's decision was a blow to the environment.
"Today's reckless but unsurprising decision from this far-right court is a triumph for corporate polluters that seek to dismantle common-sense regulations protecting clean air, clean water and a livable climate future," Hauter said in a statement.
"This decision brings into sharp relief the critical importance of electing presidents who will appoint Supreme Court justices guided by science and sound legal precedent."
In a previous interview, Pacific Legal Foundation attorney Jeffrey W. McCoy told DTN the Supreme Court could send Foster's case back to the lower courts for a new review following the Loper case ruling.
Foster has been fighting USDA's National Resources Conservation Service's determination that a .8-acre puddle on his farm is a wetland. The NRCS turned down his petition to review the determination after Foster presented a new study that he said shows there is not a natural wetland preventing him from taking part in federal programs if he farms the tract of land.
That new analysis purports to show a tree belt installed on the land in 1936 caused large snow piles in the field and is the source of the puddle.
The NRCS maintains it would not review the wetland determination because the agency's review regulation restricts reviews only if a natural event alters the topography of the hydrology of the land in question.
Foster's petition to the Supreme Court was supported by the American Farm Bureau Federation in an amicus brief filed by the group.
The AFBF argued Foster is entitled to a review because Congress changed the previous statute that granted USDA broad discretion over the terms of such reviews and replaced that with an "unconditional right to obtain review," according to the AFBF's amicus brief.
Read more on DTN:
"SCOTUS Still Considers Foster Petition," https://www.dtnpf.com/…
Todd Neeley can be reached at todd.neeley@dtn.com
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