Earlier quoted context omitted.
Federal agencies do what they’re told. The restrictions on pseudoephedrine were mandated by Congress through the Combat Methamphetamine Epidemic Act of 2005 (passed as part of the patriot act) which followed various state legislatures’ passages of similar laws. The main driving force behind the law was Bush’s White House drug task force and several members of Congress. Federal agencies very, very, rarely solicit or p…
> Combat Methamphetamine Epidemic Act of 2005 (passed as part of the patriot act) This change was passed under special anti-terrorist powers? (Not US so possible misunderstood)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Combat_Methamphetamine_Epidemi...
It was added as a part of a reauthorization of the original Patriot Act.
US Federal policy making and legislation is a bit like calvinball. And for misc reasons, Congress tends to pass large (omnibus) bills, instead of more reasonable units of work.
As an outsider looking in, I collect and read stuff about "the sausage factory".
Here's one study that looks past the folk theories, to illuminate how some example laws came to be. Similarly comprehensive books could be written about most all major legislation.
SYMPOSIUM: UNORTHODOX LAWMAKING, UNORTHODOX RULEMAKING
https://www.columbialawreview.org/content/unorthodox-lawmaki...
"The Schoolhouse Rock! cartoon version of the conventional legislative process is dead, if it was ever an accurate description in the first place. Major policy today is often the product of “unorthodox lawmaking” and “unorthodox rulemaking”—deviations from traditional process marked by frequent use of omnibus bills and multiple agency implementation; emergency statutes and regulations issued without prior comment; outsourcing to lawmaking commissions and unconventional delegates; process shortcuts outside of emergencies; presidential policymaking; and outside drafters, some nonpartisan and others hyperpartisan. These unorthodoxies are everywhere, and they have shifted the balance in the elected branches and beyond, often centralizing power in actors—like party leadership and the White House—not traditionally part of the core lawmaking and rulemaking processes. These unorthodoxies are the new textbook process."
BOOK: Unorthodox Lawmaking: New Legislative Processes in the U.S. Congress [2017]