US Supreme Court conservatives overturn 40-year-old administrative law doctrine

The US Supreme Court's 6-3 conservative majority overturned a 40-year-old administrative law doctrine that lower courts have relied on to decide thousands of cases dealing with deference to federal agencies.

The move to terminate the doctrine, known as Chevron deference, is expected to upend agency rulemaking efforts across the US government and force Congress to be far more explicit when crafting legislation for agencies to implement.

"Perhaps most fundamentally, Chevron's presumption is misguided because agencies have no special competence in resolving statutory ambiguities," Chief Justice John Roberts wrote in the June 28 majority opinion. "Courts do."

All three of the court's liberal justices joined in a dissent by Justice Elena Kagan, who argued that the majority opinion recklessly disregards four decades of legal precedent at a time when regulatory agencies face myriad complex challenges.

"It puts courts at the apex of the administrative process as to every conceivable subject — because there are always gaps and ambiguities in regulatory statutes, and often of great import," Kagan said.

The liberal justices predicted that Chevron's demise will further elevate the role of non-expert judges on matters ranging from environmental protection and public health to consumer safety.

"What actions can be taken to address climate change or other environmental challenges?" Kagan said. "In every sphere of current or future federal regulation, expect courts from now on to play a commanding role."

A 40-year precedent

The two cases before the Supreme Court — Loper Bright Enterprises v. Commerce (22-451) and Relentless Inc. v. Commerce (22-1219) — were brought in separate legal challenges to a regulation requiring domestic herring vessels to pay for fishing monitors required by federal statute.

In both cases, two appeals courts invoked Chevron in finding that the National Marine Fisheries Service's interpretation of the enabling statute at issue was reasonable. The Loper Bright and Relentless parties subsequently sought Supreme Court review, arguing that Chevron should be overturned or at least clarified to address years of confusion over its implementation.

Chevron deference was first established in Chevron v. Natural Resources Defense Council, a 1984 decision dealing with the US Environmental Protection Agency's interpretation of the term "stationary source" under the Clean Air Act. The Supreme Court's unanimous decision in favor of Chevron Corp. and the Reagan administration's reading of the Clean Air Act in the case was widely seen as a victory for conservatives at the time.

With Chevron, the court sought to rein in perceived judicial overreach at the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit by setting out a two-step test. Under step one, courts must first ask whether Congress has spoken clearly on the question of law at hand. If the law is ambiguous, step two then requires courts to defer to federal agencies' interpretations of those ambiguous enabling statutes so long as those interpretations are "reasonable."

During oral arguments for Loper Bright and Relentless in January, multiple conservative justices expressed concern that Chevron has ultimately led to regulatory flip-flopping at agencies based on which party controls the executive branch.

"That ends up with a phenomenon where we have major problems in society that aren't being solved," former Solicitor Paul Clement, who represented Loper Bright, argued before the court.

However, Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar warned during oral arguments that overturning Chevron could open "thousands" of judicial decisions on agency authority to further legal challenges — including at least 70 cases previously decided by the Supreme Court.

Conservatives say Chevron prevents judges 'from judging'

Roberts, writing for the majority, agreed with the petitioners that Chevron has produced regulatory uncertainty in practice.

"By its sheer breadth, Chevron fosters unwarranted instability in the law, leaving those attempting to plan around agency action in an eternal fog of uncertainty," Roberts said.

The chief justice noted that the Supreme Court has not deferred to an agency interpretation under Chevron since 2016, but litigants "must continue to wrestle with it" in lower courts, as the doctrine "remains on the books."

"By forcing courts to instead pretend that ambiguities are necessarily delegations, Chevron does not prevent judges from making policy," Roberts said. "It prevents them from judging."

In overturning Chevron, the majority held that the Administrative Procedure Act (APA), a 1946 statute governing agency decision-making, does not require courts to defer to agencies' interpretations of the law.

"When the best reading of a statute is that it delegates discretionary authority to an agency, the role of the reviewing court under the APA is, as always, to independently interpret the statute and effectuate the will of Congress subject to constitutional limit," Roberts said. "Courts need not and under the APA may not defer to an agency interpretation of the law simply because a statute is ambiguous," Roberts said.

In the future, courts may give "respectful consideration" to an expert agency's ability to persuade, Roberts said, but an agency's statutory interpretation "cannot bind the court."

Roberts also argued that the move to overturn Chevron respects the Supreme Court's tradition of stare decisis, or adherence to precedent. Chevron "has undermined the very 'rule of law' values that stare decisis exists to secure," Roberts said.

Roberts clarified that the majority's ruling will only apply prospectively.

"We do not call into question prior cases that relied on the Chevron framework," Roberts said. "The holdings of those cases that specific agency actions are lawful — including the Clean Air Act holding of Chevron itself — are still subject to statutory stare decisis despite our change in interpretive methodology."

"Mere reliance on Chevron cannot constitute a 'special justification' for overruling such a holding," Roberts added.

Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett joined in the opinion.

"All today's decision means is that, going forward, federal courts will do exactly as this court has since 2016, exactly as it did before the mid-1980s, and exactly as it had done since the founding: resolve cases and controversies without any systemic bias in the government's favor," Gorsuch wrote in a separate concurrence.

Thomas issued a separate concurrence reiterating previous arguments that the Chevron deference violates the US Constitution's separation of powers.

"Chevron deference compromises this separation of powers in two ways," Thomas said. "It curbs the judicial power afforded to courts, and simultaneously expands agencies' executive power beyond constitutional limits."

Liberals argue court has 'lost sight of proper role'

Kagan, in the dissent, argued that the majority's reasoning amounts to a further judicial power grab following the court's West Virginia v. EPA decision in June 2022.

In West Virginia, the conservative majority invoked what is known as the major questions doctrine for the first time in restricting the EPA's climate authority over power plants. The major questions doctrine holds that agencies cannot regulate on matters of "vast political or economic significance" without express authorization from Congress.

"In one fell swoop, the majority today gives itself exclusive power over every open issue — no matter how expertise-driven or policy-laden — involving the meaning of regulatory law," Kagan wrote for the minority.

Kagan argued that the majority opinion's justification "comes down, in the end, to this: Courts must have more say over regulation — over the provision of health care, the protection of the environment, the safety of consumer products, the efficacy of transportation systems, and so on."

"A longstanding precedent at the crux of administrative governance thus falls victim to a bald assertion of judicial authority," Kagan said. "The majority disdains restraint, and grasps for power."

Moreover, Section 706 of the Administrative Procedure Act — the section cited by the majority — does not specify any standard of judicial review for construing statutes, Kagan noted.

"Just as the provision does not prescribe a deferential standard of review, so too it does not prescribe a de novo standard of review (in which the court starts from scratch, without giving deference)," Kagan argued.

"Today's decision has no basis in the only law the majority deems relevant. It is grounded on air," she said.

Turning to stare decisis, Kagan lamented: "The majority is sanguine; I am not so much."

"Courts motivated to overrule an old Chevron-based decision can always come up with something to label a 'special justification,'" Kagan said.

"All that backs today's decision is the majority's belief that Chevron was wrong — that it gave agencies too much power and courts not enough," Kagan said. "But shifting views about the worth of regulatory actors and their work do not justify overhauling a cornerstone of administrative law. In that sense too, today's majority has lost sight of its proper role."

Joining Kagan were Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson. Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimando, et al. (No. 22-451)