[Alupis]

How about the incalculable amount of money wasted on "compliance devices" for firearms? Citizens were/are directly and negatively impacted by the flavor-of-the-week regulations BATF decided on a whim.

People are literally guessing how the BATF might decide to interpret vague laws from the 30's this week... only for them to change their mind next week and turn everyone into criminals, only to reverse course a few months later, etc.

The lawmakers skirted their responsibility to create the gun control laws some people want, so the BATF would just make some up and enforce them. Imagine having your life ruined because some unelected crusading bureaucrat decided the stock you've had on your rifle for 10 years is suddenly illegal today...

[plorg]

But then surely this is something Congress can and should remedy? Why is it a better outcome that the least accountable branch of government should claim interpretive power that was not granted to it by Congress?

[Alupis]

The SCOTUS decision basically told Congress they must write the laws instead of allowing agencies/departments to create their own "laws" that were not actually laws but were enforced like laws.

So, no, the power did not shift entirely to SCOTUS like some people have been mislead into believing. The power was taken away from the Executive Branch and restored to the Legislative Branch - as it should have been all along.

The Executive Branch (the president and their staff/appointees including those running the various enforcement agencies such as BATF, EPA, etc) have never been authorized to create laws... yet they got away with it anyway.

[fzeroracer]

No, power was explicitly shifted to SCOTUS because the goal is that judges can take any form of interpretation of the law that they want that's favorable to their political outcome. Surely you're familiar with some of the stuff the 5th circuit has been doing right? The Texas abortion bounty hunter law stood because it relies on a incredibly odious interpretation of the law by an exceedingly corrupt and unaccountable court.

Congress can and does write laws. But the quibbling now is that companies can take cases to the 5th circuit for example and argue that XYZ novel chemical isn't a pollutant because it's not explicitly enumerated in the law even if it's causing vast amounts of environmental damage. Laws will always require some form of interpretation because you simply cannot enumerate everything that can and will happen in the future and that's historically how laws were written in the past. Which is why Chevron Deference existed in the first place.

[Alupis]

> No, power was explicitly shifted to SCOTUS because the goal is that judges can take any form of interpretation of the law that they want that's favorable to their political outcome.

> by an exceedingly corrupt and unaccountable court

I don't even know where to begin with this. Your personal politics are preventing you from seeing reality. This is some really low-level election-year propaganda you have decided to believe.

> But the quibbling now is that companies can take cases to the 5th circuit for example and argue that XYZ novel chemical isn't a pollutant because it's not explicitly enumerated in the law even if it's causing vast amounts of environmental damage

This is how the process is supposed to work. An agency is not allowed to just deem things unsafe and outlaw them. The process to determine if such a chemical is harmful or if a policy is acceptable is by way of the courts. What changed here is the agencies can no longer, unilaterally and without recourse or accountability, decide what is or is not illegal. They never had that power, yet they were allowed to pretend they did for way too long.

To circumvent that process, Congress (or your state legislature in the abortion example you brought up) can and should pass laws that direct the executive branch on how to enforce the laws and what exactly they want enforced. No, laws do not need to be extremely specific as you stated, but the boundaries of enforcement should be absolute. Nobody should have to guess if an agency is going to wake up today and decide something is illegal without an actual process.

In short, any argument in favor of the previous status-quo, supporting the Chevron Deference, is an argument in favor of unelected, unaccountable bureaucrats deciding the laws of the land with no oversight and no recourse. They may change the "laws" daily, weekly, never, nobody knows! That is an insane way to run a country...

[fzeroracer]

> This is some really low-level election-year propaganda you have decided to believe.

There is no propaganda. Actions taken by a court that I view to be wholly corrupt is exactly why I left Texas, because the abortion bounty hunter laws followed by the banning of abortion had quick and decisive impact on my decision to stay in Texas.

> In short, any argument in favor of the previous status-quo, supporting the Chevron Deference, is an argument in favor of unelected, unaccountable bureaucrats deciding the laws of the land with no oversight and no recourse. They may change the "laws" daily, weekly, never, nobody knows! That is an insane way to run a country...

This is literally what the Supreme Court has been doing in the past five years alone, radically changing the status quo and upending precedent in a way that materially affects my life. People keep saying unelected, unaccountable bureaucrats but the supreme court and by extension, appointed federal judges are the epitome of that example. There is nothing I can do if I disagree with the decision of a for-life appointee, but the bureaucrats at least rotate out.

[plorg]

They are not giving Congress any power they did not already have. Nothing is stopping Congress from abolishing the EPA or explicitly delimiting what they may or may not regulate.

[themaninthedark]

The power to interpret matters of law is granted to the courts by the constitution, they do this every day.

Also, executive agencies are less accountable than judges, judges can be impeached. What can be done about the bureaucrat that decides to enact a civil forfeiture policy?

[fzeroracer]

So, how exactly can I impeach federal judges and the SCOTUS? Can you give me a guideline of how I can hold them accountable? And how many exactly have been impeached?

[Alupis]

Your congressional representative can introduce articles of impeachment against any federal judge. You elected that representative to, you know, represent you.

We also need to remain mindful that just because some law or policy isn't preferred by yourself, does not mean there is consensus or that it is the right thing to do. People very often associate the lack of a specific pet law/policy to mean Congress is ineffective when the reality is that law/policy is not actually popular outside of our information bubble.

[jachee]

> because some unelected crusading bureaucrat decided

Like an appointed-for-life judge, perhaps?

[Alupis]

A lifetime appointment does not mean they are not accountable. The federal government was designed with so-called "checks and balances", and impeaching a federal judge is one of those checks and balances. Congress can impeach and remove any federal judge.

[jachee]

> A lifetime appointment does not mean they are not accountable.

Likewise, people getting hired to agency positions doesn’t mean they are not accountable, plus they usually come with domain-specific expertise, and it doesn’t take a literal act of congress to change them.