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As a legal dilettante I have some questions: What does this decision mean for court caseload going forward? If it will increase, how much? Is there budget for

As a legal dilettante I have some questions: What does this decision mean for court caseload going forward? If it will increase, how much? Is there budget for that?

gnicholas 2y ago
It won't affect caseload so much as it will affect the balance of power in settlement negotiations. Source: I used to be a lawyer who worked in a heavily regulated field.
mike_hearn 2y ago
It doesn't mean anything for court caseload. There seem to be a lot of posts in this thread that are misinterpreting what the judgement means. Here's what I understood from reading it: • This case does not affect Congress' ability to delegate defined lawmaking powers to the executive. Congress can continue to delegate whatever they want. • It will therefore not have any impact on the speed with which the US government can pass laws. • It does not award the courts any new powers. • What it does is go back to the pre-1984 system in which the meaning of ambiguous rules were decided by the courts. • It does so on the basis of a specific law called the APA, in which Congress spelled out that the courts should defer to agencies on matters of fact, but does not say courts should defer to agencies on how to interpret ambiguous law. Also that law was passed specifically to limit the powers of the executive. So, their ruling seems founded in the will of Congress. Because ambiguous rules would have to be decided on anyway, and they were already being decided in the context of a court case, this won't affect the number of cases being decided. I think the only way to attack this ruling would be to show that there was some law that superceded or replaced the APA, or that the relevant section of the APA itself was unconstitutional. But why would it be? As the court points out, the fact that ambiguous law is interpreted by the courts is a very old and unremarkable arrangement. The Chevron decision was the radical deviation from normal practice, reversing it just puts things back to how most people already think it works.
- skhunted 2y ago
  It takes away power from the legislative and executive branches because it now requires an onerous level of specificity to regulate something. This decision will have lasting negative consequences.
- Retric 2y ago
  Case load is simply the number of active cases and therefore not limited to the number of cases but also includes how long each case takes to complete. As this requires judges to consider a wider range of options it inherently means these cases will take longer thus increasing caseload. Further, it also means bringing these cases before the court will get more expensive as individual cases take longer.
  - mike_hearn 2y ago
    You're assuming that judges are slower to resolve ambiguities than regulators are. My experience with regulators has been that often they not only let the law be ambiguous for years despite repeated requests for them to make a decision, but are then fond of retroactively and suddenly "clarifying" things in response to shifting political/media winds. Nor do they feel any obligation to be consistent with past rulings. Courts are at least expected to make progress on cases as they are brought, to be roughly consistent with past case law, and they aren't allowed to just refuse to make a decision for a decade and return to it when it's suddenly in the newspapers.
    - Retric 2y ago
      > My experience … rulings. None of what you mention really applies to specific court cases. A judge can either defer to the agency involved, or spend a while digging into the underlying intent etc. The second may be “Better” or “Worse”, but if nothing else the first is faster.
    - throwup238 2y ago
      > Nor do they feel any obligation to be consistent with past rulings. Well, you're in luck with this court!
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]

As a legal dilettante I have some questions: What does this decision mean for court caseload going forward? If it will increase, how much? Is there budget for that?

gnicholas 2y ago

It won't affect caseload so much as it will affect the balance of power in settlement negotiations. Source: I used to be a lawyer who worked in a heavily regulated field.

mike_hearn 2y ago

It doesn't mean anything for court caseload. There seem to be a lot of posts in this thread that are misinterpreting what the judgement means. Here's what I understood from reading it: • This case does not affect Congress' ability to delegate defined lawmaking powers to the executive. Congress can continue to delegate whatever they want. • It will therefore not have any impact on the speed with which the US government can pass laws. • It does not award the courts any new powers. • What it does is go back to the pre-1984 system in which the meaning of ambiguous rules were decided by the courts. • It does so on the basis of a specific law called the APA, in which Congress spelled out that the courts should defer to agencies on matters of fact, but does not say courts should defer to agencies on how to interpret ambiguous law. Also that law was passed specifically to limit the powers of the executive. So, their ruling seems founded in the will of Congress. Because ambiguous rules would have to be decided on anyway, and they were already being decided in the context of a court case, this won't affect the number of cases being decided. I think the only way to attack this ruling would be to show that there was some law that superceded or replaced the APA, or that the relevant section of the APA itself was unconstitutional. But why would it be? As the court points out, the fact that ambiguous law is interpreted by the courts is a very old and unremarkable arrangement. The Chevron decision was the radical deviation from normal practice, reversing it just puts things back to how most people already think it works.

skhunted 2y ago
It takes away power from the legislative and executive branches because it now requires an onerous level of specificity to regulate something. This decision will have lasting negative consequences.
Retric 2y ago
Case load is simply the number of active cases and therefore not limited to the number of cases but also includes how long each case takes to complete. As this requires judges to consider a wider range of options it inherently means these cases will take longer thus increasing caseload. Further, it also means bringing these cases before the court will get more expensive as individual cases take longer.
- mike_hearn 2y ago
  You're assuming that judges are slower to resolve ambiguities than regulators are. My experience with regulators has been that often they not only let the law be ambiguous for years despite repeated requests for them to make a decision, but are then fond of retroactively and suddenly "clarifying" things in response to shifting political/media winds. Nor do they feel any obligation to be consistent with past rulings. Courts are at least expected to make progress on cases as they are brought, to be roughly consistent with past case law, and they aren't allowed to just refuse to make a decision for a decade and return to it when it's suddenly in the newspapers.
  - Retric 2y ago
    > My experience … rulings. None of what you mention really applies to specific court cases. A judge can either defer to the agency involved, or spend a while digging into the underlying intent etc. The second may be “Better” or “Worse”, but if nothing else the first is faster.
  - throwup238 2y ago
    > Nor do they feel any obligation to be consistent with past rulings. Well, you're in luck with this court!

deleted 2y ago

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