While the abortion debate is front and center, climate change alarmists are all fired up about another U.S. Supreme Court opinion released last week. In West Virginia v. EPA, the court struck down the Environmental Protection Agency’s ability to pass rules aimed at curbing emissions from power plants. This may sound like it’s about the debate over how to deal with pollution, but it’s much bigger than that. The Court didn’t rule the way it did because it doesn’t like what the EPA was doing. It is saying that the EPA doesn’t have the authority to do it in the first place.
Throughout U.S. history, people have elected their members of Congress to enact laws addressing major federal issues. But over time, Congress began passing fewer and fewer laws. For those of us who think we have too many laws already, that part was a good thing. Unfortunately, federal agencies stepped in to fill the void, adopting thousands and thousands of rules that have the force of law.
There are now so many federal regulations that one civil rights attorney and author famously proclaimed that the average person commits three felonies a day. Indeed, the Federal Register that publishes all of these rules passed by non-elected bureaucracies now totals more than 70,000 pages. Stacked up, that would be higher than a two-story house. It’s literally impossible for the average person to understand how these rules impact them, much less try to comply with them all.
That’s why the recent EPA case is so important. The Supreme Court essentially said that on major questions that impact our lives, our elected representatives in Congress must pass laws or expressly grant administrative agencies the authority to regulate us in place of a federal law. Thus, agencies like the EPA can’t just “pass” their own laws without congressional approval. This comes on the heels of similar decisions restraining federal agencies, such as the case striking down the CDC’s mask mandate in airports and on airplanes and other forms of public transportation. In both instances, these agencies overstepped their authority and were put in their place by the courts.
The growing number of examples of judges imposing restraint on federal agency overreach represents a huge victory for average Americans. We elect people to Congress for a reason. They are the ones who should be held accountable for passing the laws that we have to live under. We are entitled to know who voted to impose regulations on our lives and why, so that we can hold them accountable at the ballot box. When we allow unelected bureaucrats to lord over us, there is very little we can do to hold them accountable for their actions.
Even if you agreed with the EPA’s actions on pollution or the CDC’s mask mandate, you should applaud rulings like these. Regardless of where you stand on them, your vote should matter on major policy issues. Now, hopefully more and more issues will be debated and voted on in Congress, not delegated to a faceless bureaucracy. At least reducing all those pages of federal regulations will save us some trees.
Justin Owen is president & CEO of the Beacon Center of Tennessee, the state’s premier free market think tank.
For years liberals/progressives relied on the Court and courts to insinuate their policies into the laws because they knew they didn’t have the popular support of the public to have them passed by Congress or state legislatures. Thus there was a patchwork of whole cloth with bits and pieces here and there. Then there the regulations written in such a way the bureaus were established with the ability to create their own standards rather enforce those set by Congress, a mismash of constantly changing standards and rules depending on who was in power. The EPA and Health being the two most often cited for overstepping their bounds, bounds which were never set in the first place!
Response to “joe23006 on 1:11 pm July 20, 2022 who said,
” For years liberals/progressives relied on the Court and courts to insinuate their policies into the laws because they knew they didn’t have the popular support of the public to have them passed by Congress or state legislatures….”
This Brought to mind The 1976 Movie, ” NETWORK, ” which expressed the thoughts of Many American Voters when The Punch line of ” The movie was given, The Star of the Movie to say , ” I’m as mad as Hell, And I’m Not Going to Take It Anymore…” Howard Beale { Peter Finch,) In ” NETWORK, ” The American people Are ” Mad As Hell, And…They’re …” not Going To Take It Anymore.” “…Mad at the fear that keeps people indoors, watching T.V. …Mad at Inflation and the Russians…” UKRaine. Quoted Material From a Review of The Movie, ” NETWORK. “
The socialist/ Communist, democrat, Party of America, ever since DEMOCRAT PRESIIDENT ROOSEVELT’s ” New Deal, ” have tried to ” Pack the Supreme Court.” The democrats are trying this plot again, except this time around, they’re using sex and race.
Next step: require a sunset clause on every law, so that it lapses unless the legislature re-confirms it every year or two. Forcing the legislature to pass laws directly (rather than delegate the work to bureaucracies), and then to re-confirm existing law regularly, will guarantee that the most important laws, and only the most important laws, remain on the books.
AND RESTRICT any bureaucratic org, such as the EPA< from being ALLOWED TO PASS their own laws, without having to have it go through an actual legislature..
The courts EPA ruling was an act to prevent the rule of American power by unelected Party indoctrinated apparatchiks who never stood for office for vetting by THE PEOPLE to run the branches of government unopposed. Fitting Justice indeed that the newly organized Supreme court is empowering the legislatures of THE PEOPLE both federally and State, to check and balance an overly eager executive orderer, right at a time when The Wicked Witch of the West Coast is about to have an electoral house drop on her in the fall. So much power to do good placed in her hands, with so much potential human life force wasted in greed, envy, and pride, wrath, lust gluttony and sloth. Even the Obama planted 5th columnist Soros education paid judges are getting their fingers rapped and forced to toe the line. Thank Donald Trump for the Judicial Supreme gifts that keeps on giving.
Reply To inluminatuo comments, you were right in your comments and I Agree With you.
The Chuck Schumers and Nancy Pelosi, the democrat party Would turn America into just another George Soros. socialist America.” WoKE ” Is Just a way to get there.
As this quote says,” I Believe there are more Instances of the abridgement of freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachment’s than by violence.” James Madison
” the Federal Register that publishes all of these rules passed by non-elected bureaucracies now totals more than 70,000 pages….” THIs is exactly Why Obama Care Passed Because There Were So Many Pages to Obama Care That Nobody Read Obama Care, just passed it and That Might Have Been the Plan All Along by the Democrat elite.
All the CZARS in this administration need to be terminated. Congress needs to step and establish our laws not agenda pushing Czars via regulations. That’s if they can take time away from begging for campaign donations for their next elections.
ALL the bureaucracies in govt, THAT ARE NOT EXPRESSLY Called for by our constitution, need to be terminated… WITH EXTREME pejudice!