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Supreme Court limits EPA’s power to cut emissions

bbc.com

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Re: Supreme Court limits EPA’s power to cut emissions

#641

Post by AlexandrB »

cloutchaser wrote: post #119
elmerfud wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't agree it will be chaos. Congress has for far too long abdicated what it is supposed to be directly responsible for to unelected bureaucrats that exist in agencies that are overseen by the executive branch of government. Congress is now free to focused on creating chaos between the people that elect them. When is the last time you've seen anyone from Congress campaign on any substantive issue? I've not seen it…

Quoted post unavailable.

The idea that Republicans are seeking increased states' rights in good faith is contradicted my most available evidence. Not only have they fought legalizing weed federally, but right after the Roe v. Wade ruling we had Republican politicians advocating for a federal abortion ban[1].

Believing that these ruling will make things more democratic requires ignoring what Republican lawmakers both say and do.

[1] https://news.yahoo.com/mike-pence-celebrates-end-roe-1529376...

Re: Supreme Court limits EPA’s power to cut emissions

#642

Post by giantg2 »

gumby wrote: post #24

What’s interesting about this ruling (if you listened to the oral arguments and read the ruling) is that it appears to undercut the ability for any executive agency to make a rule, under them claim that congress cannot delegate its powers. So the FAA can’t determine and then require that aircraft have transponders. Congress has to do this. If they continue down this path it will be chaos.

I didn't see the claim that they can't delegate. The issue I saw discussed is whether or not a specific power was delegated. I don't see rhem invalidating all agency regulations. I do see them requiring better definitions to support that regulation. (Eg C02 was not considered a pollutant under the original grant of power, so the court doesn't want to interpret it to be inclusive).

Re: Supreme Court limits EPA’s power to cut emissions

#643

Post by JamesBarney »

xyzzyz wrote: post #623
rayiner wrote: post #306

Headlines about Supreme Court cases are almost uniformly misleading, because they suggest the Court is making decisions on policy issues rather than legal issues. The very first words of the opinion, on p. 2, make clear that the legal issue before the Court is very different: https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/21pdf/20-1530_n758.pdf The Clean Air Act does not purport to give the EPA blanket regulatory authority ov…

The headlines aren’t entirely wrong. If you look at the conservative majority opinions, you’ll find that indeed, it’s about the relevant legal issues, ie. what the law actually says. On the other hand, if you read liberal dissents, they’re mostly about what they think appropriate policy should be. In this particular case, the majority opinion starts off by quoting the relevant statute and analyzing its meaning, where…

The roe v Wade decision seemed to follow a similar pattern with the conservative opinion being about how there isn't really a basis for a constitutional right to an abortion up to viability (seems true) and the liberal dissenting opinion was about how the decision was going to be bad for women (also true) and how this opens up the floodgates to reversing a lot of other important supreme court decisions ( not sure how true that is)

Re: Supreme Court limits EPA’s power to cut emissions

#644

Post by SllX »

Workaccount2 wrote: post #404
rayiner wrote: post #306

Headlines about Supreme Court cases are almost uniformly misleading, because they suggest the Court is making decisions on policy issues rather than legal issues. The very first words of the opinion, on p. 2, make clear that the legal issue before the Court is very different: https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/21pdf/20-1530_n758.pdf The Clean Air Act does not purport to give the EPA blanket regulatory authority ov…

So the EPA is kneecapped since they have to go through the most ineffective and hyper partisan congress since the founding of the country.

Well there was once a Congress that passed the Missouri Compromise which institutionalized hyper-partisanship and another that was so ineffective its successor Congress literally fell apart when several States seceded from the Union and those States then went to War with the Union.

So, cut the hyperbole. Partisanship has always been a political reality. The EPA is capped to the powers that Congress gave it, and does not have the autonomy to expand that power at will because they’re subordinate to the President and the President cannot unilaterally and legally make laws on his own, nor can any of the agencies which answer to him.

Re: Supreme Court limits EPA’s power to cut emissions

#645

Post by Retric »

rayiner wrote: post #306

Headlines about Supreme Court cases are almost uniformly misleading, because they suggest the Court is making decisions on policy issues rather than legal issues. The very first words of the opinion, on p. 2, make clear that the legal issue before the Court is very different: https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/21pdf/20-1530_n758.pdf The Clean Air Act does not purport to give the EPA blanket regulatory authority ov…

You don’t get say civil asset forfeiture from simply reading the constitution and ruling based on it.

Cases make it to the Supreme Court because the outcome is ambiguous, so the court can’t actually make decisions based on an objective standard. It’s simply not how they operate in this or any other court.

Instead the outcome is decided and various legal justifications are provided by both the justices who agree and those who disagree. You can agree or disagree with the outcome of any case, but there’s a reason the appointment of Supreme Court justices is considered so politically important, it’s a political job.

Re: Supreme Court limits EPA’s power to cut emissions

#646

Post by matthewdgreen »

lolinder wrote: post #598
matthewdgreen wrote: post #437

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This case could have been decided either way. The result clearly depends on the makeup of the Court and the justices' personal inclinations. As evidence: a very similar question was decided by the Court in 2009, with a completely different result [1]. [1] https://ballotpedia.org/Massachusetts_v._Environmental_Prote...

This doesn't make OP's point less true: the headlines surrounding this decision are misleading. This is not judicial overreach, it's an application of a different theory of judicial review than we've become accustomed to, and it's not necessarily a bad one. If we don't like it when the police creatively interpret laws to target minorities, can we allow the EPA the authority to creatively interpret laws to target foss…

A court that is unconstrained by precedent can arrive at any policy outcome it wants: simply tailor a "novel" legal theory that gives you the desired result, then ignore past decisions that use different theories. Past Courts have worked extremely hard to avoid this: they viewed it as fatal to the legitimacy of the Court. They were right.

Re: Supreme Court limits EPA’s power to cut emissions

#647

Post by themaninthedark »

kmeisthax wrote: post #636
politician wrote: post #607

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And yet, fixing that problem -- the problem of the ineffectiveness and hyper-partisanship of Congress -- would have so many positive effects for all of our lives regardless of our ideological perspectives that it should be our number one priority as the electorate.

The ineffectiveness and hyperpartisanship of Congress is directly attributable to the ideological perspectives of the electorate. Also, Congress is not as ineffective and hyperpartisan as you think. It's only on issues that have public attention that they act this way. When nobody is looking they move quickly and decisively.

So true, see the Patriot Act, DMCA and all the anti-network Neutrality bills.

Re: Supreme Court limits EPA’s power to cut emissions

#648

Post by egg1 »

jimmygrapes wrote: post #296
ComputerGuru wrote: post #221

PDF of the ruling: https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/21pdf/20-1530_n758.pdf As usual, it’s more nuanced than the headline.

I truly wish more people were legally literate, and considering how much intellectual overlap there is between software engineering and legal writing I would have expected better from the HN crowd, but so far all I see is a lot of talking point parroting about partisanship from those who clearly haven't even tried to read the rulings.

Seriously, if just a fraction of "intellectuals" in other fields took some time to read the past 50-odd years worth of Supreme Court rulings, there wouldn't be all this pointless bickering over basic facts. If anything, the Warren/Burger courts were egregious in making up constitutional rights out of thin air based on their moral beliefs, and not the letter of the law. It's a shame that it takes a far-right Supreme Court for people to finally understand that it's Congress's job to pass new laws, not the judiciary branch.

Re: Supreme Court limits EPA’s power to cut emissions

#649

Post by chronometry888 »

biggieshellz wrote: post #6

Major questions doctrine. They ruled that the current law does not empower EPA to require producers to shift generation to different methods (e.g. natural gas, renewables), and that if Congress had meant for the law to do that, they would have written it explicitly. Congress can still pass a law empowering EPA to regulate greenhouse gas emissions.

No they can't. I mean, legally they have the authority to do so. But congress is pretty broken. By the time a congress is elected that can effectively legislate a solution to climate change, it will be too late.

Giving a broken legislative body the sole responsibility of literally saving the world is a really, really dumb idea.

Re: Supreme Court limits EPA’s power to cut emissions

#650

Post by brandonr49 »

xyzzyz wrote: post #623
rayiner wrote: post #306

Headlines about Supreme Court cases are almost uniformly misleading, because they suggest the Court is making decisions on policy issues rather than legal issues. The very first words of the opinion, on p. 2, make clear that the legal issue before the Court is very different: https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/21pdf/20-1530_n758.pdf The Clean Air Act does not purport to give the EPA blanket regulatory authority ov…

The headlines aren’t entirely wrong. If you look at the conservative majority opinions, you’ll find that indeed, it’s about the relevant legal issues, ie. what the law actually says. On the other hand, if you read liberal dissents, they’re mostly about what they think appropriate policy should be. In this particular case, the majority opinion starts off by quoting the relevant statute and analyzing its meaning, where…

I suspect there are a great many existing laws that congress would not pass today.
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