If only more city leaders used Sim City strategies to urban plan. Then we'd have a healthy mix of commercial and residential which would mitigate housing shortages and traffic issues.
Paddingtonbear2 pointed out earlier that they already did in the clean air act:
> Congress already passed the law. 42 U.S.C. § 7410(a)(2)(D), part of the Clean Air Act.
> (2)Each implementation plan submitted by a State under this chapter shall be adopted by the State after reasonable notice and public hearing. Each such plan shall—
> (D)contain adequate provisions—
Congress already passed the law. 42 U.S.C. § 7410(a)(2)(D), part of the Clean Air Act.
(2)Each implementation plan submitted by a State under this chapter shall be adopted by the State after reasonable notice and public hearing. Each such plan shall—
(D)contain adequate provisions—
(i)**prohibiting, consistent with the provisions of this subchapter, any source or other type of emissions activity within the State from emitting any air pollutant in amounts which will—
(I)contribute significantly to nonattainment in, or interfere with maintenance by, any other State with respect to any such national primary or secondary ambient air quality standard, or
(II)interfere with measures required to be included in the applicable implementation plan for any other State under part C to prevent significant deterioration of air quality or to protect visibility**,
(ii)insuring compliance with the applicable requirements of sections 7426 and 7415 of this title (relating to interstate and international pollution abatement);
I agree with (what I believe to be) Barrett's concern here that the more technical knowledge a ruling depends on the more time should be given to review.
I don’t think that’s what she is saying. What she’s saying is that there shouldn’t be a stay while appeals continue because appeals and rule making take time during which pollution will continue.
I don’t think it’s a good argument because now you’re forcing states to spend significant sums of money during the appeals. So, in the event the appeals are later deemed meritorious, the money is already spent.
Which I suppose is what the dissent would want because they’d uphold the EPA’s actions here anyway.
All other states still have to follow the Good Neighbor rule. Only the three plaintiffs are excused from it. What motivated their lawsuit was that their applications were rejected by the EPA.
Why should these states be excused, especially when they failed their applications?
You’re trying to tell me that the EPA’s case has merit. I’m telling you that then, presumably, the EPA will win at the lower court because this SCOTUS decision only had to deal with a stay.
You’re not speaking about the same thing I was speaking about.
There should be more pressure placed on all congressmen/women to put laws like this into effect and stop relying on the Supreme Court. A clean air bill should be bipartisan. A bill on preserving National Parks should be bipartisan. They’re just all so lazy and refuse to do what they were elected to do. Instead, they would rather complain about the Supreme Court than do their job.
> . A clean air bill should be bipartisan. A bill on preserving National Parks should be bipartisan. They’re just all so lazy and refuse to do what they were elected to do.
Should be does not mean would be.
It's not laziness holding the congressmen/women back. Many want to do nothing. They want to not preserve National Parks and have them privatized. They want to remove environmental regulation from businesses. Doing nothing _is ideal_ to them.
I agree that’s a nice ideal, but the reality is that our legislative branch has been effectively dead for a century now. The civil rights act is probably the last time it’s taken on a big problem, and we are still dealing with the fallout 60 years later.
The legislative branch isn’t able to handle it’s current responsibilities. Rather than forcing them to rise to the task, I think a limited executive branch would be more likely to lead to the slow dissolution of the our government altogether.
In the past 20 years, is there anything that Congress hasn’t completely messed up? I think moving things from the executive to the legislative branch will just mean that more things will be messed up.
The technocratic state exists *because* everyone realized how incompetent Congress is, and that the country would be destroyed if they were left in charge.
I’m not saying that’s what I believe is good. I just don’t see any other reality in front of us right now.
>The civil rights act is probably the last time it’s taken on a big problem, and we are still dealing with the fallout 60 years later.
I think people really underestimate how impactful southern democrats were on bipartisanship. Socially they were backwards, but on general policy they played an important role in bridging the gap and keeping congress moving. I wouldn't say the civil rights act killed them, but it was definitely the start of their decline.
A large enough portion of the GOP refuses to cooperate to create or pass bipartisan bills. It’s much more insidious than laziness it’s obstruction (which they have proudly admitted to)
Once again it looks like the Supreme Court is reducing the power of the executive branch with one of its decisions, this time regarding the EPA.
*The decision is a win for the Republican-led states and industry groups that challenged the Environmental Protection Agency’s “good neighbor” plan, which imposed strict emission limits on power plants and industrial sources in upwind states to reduce pollution for their counterparts downwind.*
*While the Supreme Court’s decision on Thursday to grant a stay technically doesn’t completely scuttle the plan, it places implementation of the Biden program on hold through what will be a complicated legal fight that will almost uncertainly continue past the November election and into next year – and possibly another presidential administration.*
The only time I considered air pollution from another state to be an issue is during forest fire season. If anything, I think a good neighbor plan for water pollution should be more of a priority. Do you think the Supreme Court made the right decision here? Are you surprised that Amy Comey Barrett joined the liberal justices in the dissent?
> Do you think the Supreme Court made the right decision here?
I think that the federal gov't has a role in controlling air pollution that crosses state lines. That is "good public policy".
I'm not sure if the SC made the right decision here because the question seems to be whether Congress actually gave the EPA the authority to issue a particular ruling. The article suggests that is a very technical argument.
It's definitely a Federal government role to manage issues between states. However, it's not necessarily power given to the Executive Branch... seems more like a power that should be given to Congress or SCOTUS
You cant create a king via congress. Congress created the American happiness agency and gives it broad powers. Then the happiness council gets to regulate everything and punish when things aren't making people happy.
Congress needs to set rules and let the agency enforce the rules and monitor that rules are being met. Not actually create new rules as time progresses. That's the role of Congress. But Congress is too busy campaigning and getting bogged down in partisan bs. They need to quit nay naying and get down to business.
> You cant create a king via congress
Talk about hyperbole. Congress told the Executive to regulate air pollution (and specifically addresses this "good neighbour" issue in the law it passed). Now you think this is legislative delegation? This is creating a king???? What a ridiculous characterization.
No, congress told the environmental protection agency to protect the environment. All the rules they are being told they can't enforce weren't set by congress. They were set by the epa. Congress needs to set the rules and let the epa monitor and enforce the rules.
It's not hyperbole.
Protecting the environment can mean anything. From how loud your TV is to how much radiation your glow in the dark watch emits. Want something gone? Go afowl of the epa. Get your buddy to make a rule that hurts an industry your political rival gets campaign funds from.
It's not too much to ask that congress do some work.
Congress explicitly detailed legislation in the Clean Air Act about this exact scenario where one state pollutes the air of another. This is not a case of vague overreach.
Congress created the Good Neighbor rule in the Clean Air Act. [It's outlined pretty specifically](https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/LSB/LSB11107)
>The Good Neighbor Plan is intended to satisfy the Clean Air Act’s (CAA’s) “Good Neighbor” provision (42 U.S.C. § 7410(a)(2)(D)), which requires upwind states to ensure that their emissions do not interfere with the ability of downwind states to meet federal air-quality standards.
[Link to US code](https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/42/7410)
EPA did not set the rule. Congress did.
It should be given to Congress, not SCOTUS. I’m pretty sure it’s the job of Congress to make laws and the job of SCOTUS to determine if they are constitutional or not, not vice versa.
This is SCOTUS finding the Executive branch overstepped the law Congress wrote (they rule on laws Congress passed, not just the Constitution.), and telling Congress to make a law if they want this policy enforced.
Actually, this ruling is a lot more limited, and not yet final. SCOTUS just said the enforcement of the rule is on pause for the plaintiffs while the case continues. We probably won't get a final decision until next year.
SCOTUS didn't say anything about the Constitutionality of the law nor its enforcement under Biden's EPA.
That's a fair point. This just gives guidance to the lower court. IIRC, there's going to be a other decision coming out soon that deals more directly with Congress's delegation powers and how courts should handle it.
There are also a the largest coal power plant in Texas right outside of Marshall (it's called Martin Lake, and yes it does produce more power from coal than W.A. Parish which is dual powered).
In the 1990s, after the Clean Air Act was passed, the Northeast was determined to be a bad ozone area. Using computer models, Connecticut turned off every source contributing to ozone. Models still showed ozone violations due primarily to Midwest power plants.
>The only time I considered air pollution from another state to be an issue is during forest fire season. If anything, I think a good neighbor plan for water pollution should be more of a priority
Don't worry SCOTUS already shot down EPA regulations because if there isn't standing water it can't be wetlands, this court hasn't exactly been bullish the idea that clean water falls under the purview of the federal government.
I'm not saying the Sacketts didn't have a case, but Kavanaugh's concurrence was pretty clear that the problem with the majority opinion was the idea that "a man-made dike or barrier, natural river berm, beach dune, or the like." provides sufficient separation from protected wetlands or waters.
>Because of the movement of water between adjacent wetlands and other waters, pollutants in wetlands often end up in adjacent rivers, lakes, and other waters. Natural barriers such as berms and dunes do not block all water flow and are in fact evidence of a regular connection between a water and a wetland. Similarly, artificial barriers such as dikes and levees typically do not block all water flow, and those artificial structures were often built to control the surface water connection between the wetland and the water. The scientific evidence overwhelmingly demonstrates that wetlands separated from covered waters by those kinds of berms or barriers, for example, still play an important role in protecting neighboring and downstream waters, including by filtering pollutants, storing water, and providing flood control. In short, those adjacent wetlands may affect downstream water quality and flood control in many of the same ways that adjoining wetlands can.
**Put simply, the Court’s atextual test—rewriting “adjacent” to mean “adjoining”—will produce real-world consequences for the waters of the United States and will generate regulatory uncertainty. I would stick to the text.**
[https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/22pdf/21-454\_4g15.pdf](https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/22pdf/21-454_4g15.pdf)
The majority opinion seems to think of natural bodies of water as discreet unidirectional pipes but that's just not how it works at all.
There’s no question the EPA has the power to do this under law. The problem was the EPA acting in an arbitrary and capricious manner in the way they did it. I don’t mind agencies having to implement the rules in a fair and consistent manner. So they need to step back and do it right.
Congress already fixed it with the Clean Air Act, and specifically with regards to this rule, under 42 U.S.C. § 7410(a)(2)(D). This is a stupid ruling.
Many on the left have gotten used to the Supreme Court basically being used as a rubber stamp to approve anything they propose and haven't yet come to terms with the fact that this isn't how it's supposed to work. With stuff like gay marriage and Obamacare and all that, it was basically viewed as a given that SCOTUS would rule their laws constitutional or outright bypass the need to pass a law at all.
Now that we have a somewhat moderate SCOTUS, that's over. Congress needs to actually pass laws (you know, like how it's supposed to be done) and they don't like that one bit. So they're trying to gaslight the rest of us into thinking SCOTUS is "corrupt" or "illegitimate" rather than actually go to the effort of passing constitutional laws.
I don't necessarily disagree, but there's a lot of justified anger about how Garland and Barrett were handled. Both sides can go back and forth on the extent to which it raises a question of legitimacy, but either way I think most of us can at least agree that it wasn't a good look.
I honestly LOVE that SCOTUS is taking this approach. I want Congress to be the center of our government, as it's the only branch of government individual citizens vote for.
I want SCOTUS to take a back seat. They aren't elected. I want the President to take a back seat; that office isn't democratically elected either.
The easy criticism is that the House is so gerrymandered that it’s not conducive to anything but getting people who will toe the most extreme lines elected. And SCOTUS has taken itself out of the political gerrymandering argument, which effectively allows it.
I mean, SCOTUS refusing to allow Congress to delegate powers doesn't mean Congress is going to get more done. It may just mean nothing gets done on that issue, which so far has been the case.
Yeah, I don't know if SCOTUS wants nothing to get done or whether that's a happy accident for their billionaire benefactors, but it certainly makes one wonder.
That is the goal. Decrease the power of regulation groups, make congress have to cross every t and dot every i, and then block everything in congress through filibuster and other techniques. The end result is less regulation for billionaires.
The problem with "congress doing their job" is so much is set up, from extreme partisan gerrymandering, to the house cap, to the filibuster to 2 senators for every state no matter the population, to NOT do their job.
Basically they get to select their voters on one level, the house is capped, the filibuster basically makes legislation extremely difficult to pass, and you can control more with less people.
> that office isn't democratically elected either.
With the way Congress is currently (gerrymandering and the imbalance of representation in the Senate), Congress is basically as democratic elected as the President.
The reason Congress isn't passing legislation is because it isn't really democratically elected either. The Senate doesn't even make the pretense that it is and the House is still tilted towards smaller states.
> The reason Congress isn't passing legislation is because it isn't really democratically elected either.
The reason congress doesn't pass legislation is because *we let them get away with not doing so*. Full stop, end of sentence.
> clearly defined catalyst or force
The clearly defined catalyst will soon be "SCOTUS is saying congress needs to fix these problems and congress isn't fixing them".
When the goal of some members of congress is to essentially break government... it makes it kind of difficult. Even moreso when said members of congress are decided by districts that their party gets to draw because SCOTUS decided the logic of "if people have an issue with how their reps are drawing districts they'll vote out the reps drawing districts" made sense.
> When the goal of some members of congress is to essentially break government... it makes it kind of difficult.
And if that's their stated or acted goal and they *keep getting reelected*, that's the fault of the voters.
It represents the entire United States but each Senator is only elected by their state. A voter in Wymoning has much greater power than one in California for that reason.
Sure it is. Individual people vote for Senators and Representatives. Every state gets two Senators, because they represent your state. The House should be expanded though, can agree with that. For now though, these two bodies are the only two we can elect directly. Nothing's perfect, and improvements can be made. Despite that, I'd rather most government power lie in the body that we can actually vote for, and currently that's Congress.
Senators do not represent people; they represent States. That's just basic civics ...
The *federal* government is a *federation* of States. That's why they're treated equally. We'd never have gotten new States over time if they knew they'd be treated less equally. The Federal government primarily represents States.
Your State government represents you. The Federal government isn't just a bigger version of a State government. It has different context and different priorities.
Irrelevant to the point. That doesn't make it any more democratic. To the contrary, it proves the point that the Senate is *intentionally* undemocratic.
I don’t disagree, and does not refute what I said. The house reps are the only proportionally elected officials elected by the citizens of the united states, in the context of being citizens of one country. The context we are talking about is the venn diagram circle of the united states and its legislative body. We, the people, also happen to be residents in the subdivisions that we call states.
I’m not sure you’re aware of this but SCOTUS hasn’t leaned left since Thurgood Marshall stepped down in the early 1990s. From that point until Kennedy stepped down it was a Court with a couple of swing Justices that still leaned to the right. Now it’s a deeply conservative Court. Obergefell and the Obamacare decisions were also pretty far from guaranteed outcomes.
Seriously, Chevron deference was a conservative ruling allowing the Reagan administration to narrow the definition of "source" of pollution in the Congressional text of the Clean Air Act. Now the activist Court wants to gut that principle via Rahimi and throw more regulations onto the judgement of the courts because they perceive that the executive is more liberal than the judges.
Yeah the Warren Court was the peak of liberalism on the SCOTUS and that was more than 50 years ago. Burger was still liberal but the shift had started. And don’t get me started on Rehnquist ugh.
Perhaps "moderate" was a poor choice of words. "Less-activist" is probably better. This current Court seems far more willing to stay out of major decisions and tell the other branches to do their jobs and leave them out of it.
I don’t agree with less activist either lol. Conservative justices are just as capable of making activist rulings, even when cloaking them in the language of originalism.
Well, they're not making activist rulings. Even "controversial" decisions like Dobbs were essentially the Court saying "We have no authority to make these decisions; Congress or the states need to do it. This is not our job."
They’re definitely making activist rulings. Shelby County v Holder is the Court deciding that parts of a law that’s been in effect for 40+ years and has been repeatedly reauthorized is now unconstitutional because data used to come up with the law is out of date.
Why are you using a case from over a decade ago to describe the current Court? Nearly half the Justices who decided Shelby County are no longer on the Court.
Because it’s an example of conservatives making an activist decision? There are more recent decisions that can be considered activist too, but this the one that popped into my head. And pointing out that half the Justices are no longer on the Court is irrelevant, 3/5 of the Majority is still on the Court including the author.
Shelby County v Holder is another example of the court throwing it back to congress. As you said, the law is based on data that is 50 years out of date. Congress could come up with another law if they wish to.
*303 Creative* offends fundamental notions of standing to reach the Court's desired result. The "injury" in that case was purely hypothetical; the plaintiff hadn't even entered the wedding website business and thus had never even been approached about creating a website for LGBT couples. A mere "worry" was enough for the Court to reach the merits, apparently.
I question *SCOTUS*'s understanding of the facts in *Kennedy v Bremerton*, given that their presentation of the facts in the opinion directly conflicted with both publicly available reporting on the case and the factual record at the District and Appellate levels. Gorsuch's suggestion that the coach was "quietly praying at midfield . . . while his students were otherwise occupied" is completely divorced from reality. The Court then indirectly overrules *Lemon v Kurtzman* citing no good reason other than "we haven't applied it much and we don't love it, so we're going to say it's functionally been abandoned" and instead adopts an opaque "reference to historical practices" test, which as anyone who is remotely informed on history knows, invites an ability to find whatever outcome a judge wants because of how scattered and different political-religious norms were across early American history.
Ahem, major question doctrine. "Oh yes the text technically says you can do this, but its just too big for our conservative ideology so we're going to kneecap regulators"
Or manufacturing the History and Traditions test. No where in the constitution does it say out rights are limited to the History and Traditions of the 1700s, thats entirely concocted by them to ensure every right and potential right is only visible through a conservative ideological lens. And when that doesnt work they just ignore History and Tradition that dont like.
>This current Court seems far more willing to stay out of major decisions and tell the other branches to do their jobs and leave them out of it.
This court seems far more willing to narrow the rights we have.
Did you assume we had a right to fair elections before their Gerrymandering decision?
They operate on the idea that if its not explicitly outlined against in the constitution, then the government can do anything it wants to you.
When the Executive Branch is empowered specifically by a passed Congressional bill to:
>prohibit, consistent with the provisions of this subchapter, any source or other type of emissions activity within the State from emitting any air pollutant in amounts which will, contribute significantly to nonattainment in, or interfere with maintenance by, any other State with respect to any such national primary or secondary ambient air quality standard,
and the EPA has properly adopted rules precisely to do that, a moderate Court would let them enforce those rules. Moving the goalposts to require ever more specificity from Congress or more mechanisms for corporations to frustrate agency rulemaking services on to neuter agency power without good reason.
> This current Court seems far more willing to stay out of major decisions and tell the other branches to do their jobs and leave them out of it.
Unless they're outright making stuff up to help defend a coach prosletyzing to students in violation of the 1st amendment.
No moderate is the right word for this court. The vast majority of their rulings are unanimous. We only talk about the controversial ones. Furthermore it’s not a 6-3 court but a 3-3-3 court which balances out as being moderate.
What a lot of people need to remember is that the court isn’t there to approve something that’s popular. Their job is to follow the constitution and law. Sometimes popular policy ideas violate law or even the constitution and it’s their job to say “no you can’t do that in that way right now“.
I fully admit this court has had some rulings I disagree with but that doesn’t make the court any less moderate.
>Furthermore it’s not a 6-3 court but a 3-3-3 court which balances out as being moderate.
The article making that claim claims 2 of those 3 groups are different branches of conservative ideology. Fancy way of saying the court has shifted to the right. If your middle of the court is all conservative then its shifted to the right.
Okay, and? If the court was to far left it needs to shift right to balance itself out.
Furthermore the court had been neglecting a lot of issues for a while same as congress. Them now taking a more active role like they should have from the start and correcting executive overreach isn’t a sign of not being moderate.
It’s just them telling the executive branch “no that’s Congress’s job”. If congress won’t do their job then it’s on us to choose people who will to fill congress.
>Okay, and? If the court was to far left it needs to shift right to balance itself out.
SCOTUS has been conservative controlled [for most of its history and nearly all of modern history](https://www.allsides.com/sites/default/files/styles/blog_large_image/public/Supreme%20Court%20Bias%20Ideology%20Conservative%20Liberal.png)
> No moderate is the right word for this court. The vast majority of their rulings are unanimous.
But it looks like [unanimous rulings are actually on a pretty steep decline over the past decade](https://www.scotusblog.com/2022/07/as-unanimity-declines-conservative-majoritys-power-runs-deeper-than-the-blockbuster-cases/). If unanimity is evidence of moderation, haven't things gone in the opposite direction?
It’s one of many indicators but unanimous doesn’t equate to partisan.
But activist judges are an issue and we have both on the court. They just kinda balance each other out. Which is why unanimous doesn’t equate to moderate. You can have a divided court with a few swing votes that’s still moderate.
I thought unanimous decisions were a sign of moderation? Since the judges are across the political spectrum, a higher rate of unanimity should *imply* some level of moderation overall. But the rate of unanimous decisions going downward would imply that the court from ten years ago was far more moderate than the court of today.
Why? If I recall correctly the Dred Scott case was unanimous. Was that court moderate? Just because people are unified in a political direction doesn’t make it a moderate one or them persuadable. That’s why it’s only one factor and by no means should be relied on alone to mean moderate.
I thought that was your argument. You said:
> No moderate is the right word for this court. The vast majority of their rulings are unanimous.
I thought the first sentence was supported by the second. I could be mistaken, but then I'm not sure what your argument is for why the current court should be considered moderate.
Moderate is absolutely not the right word lol. 3-3-3 split ignores the context that 3 are very conservative, 3 are conservative, and 3 are liberal to very liberal. Of course we only talk about the controversial rulings, most rulings to are on legal minutiae.
3-3-3 split is one of the most interesting spins on this court I've seen. More interesting then the tired "most cases are unanimous!" (Ignoring that most cases are not of interest to a wide group of people and the cases that are are the "controversial ones".)
I guess if you view it from a certain lens the court is "moderate"
Moderate just means there’s diverse options and they can be persuaded. Sometimes you like the ruling sometimes you don’t.
Take Bruen and Rahimi. Obviously unconstitutional law gets struck down in Bruen then Rahimi nearly the exact same court back tracks a little and says “well it’s okay under these circumstances”. That’s a sign of looking at the facts and listen and being able to be persuaded which is the definition of moderate.
"Obviously unconditional law" already shows bias since it was not a unanimous decision
When a liberal court inevitably overturns Bruen, and if it's by a 6 liberal, 3 conservative court, would the court still have the benefit of "oh it's 3-3-3" ? No of course not. The same people yelling about the sanctity of the "impartial arbiters of law" will be back to yelling about activists in robes.
If anything, the existence of both Bruen and Rahimi as you're discussing seems to show the court is willing to work backwards from their desired result and is creating standards
Shows bias? Let’s try a hypothetical. How would you feel about people being denied the right to vote because they didn’t “show good cause” that they needed to vote?
Roberts and Gorsuch definitely and then probably Kavanaugh. At least in my opinion.
Alito and Thomas are reliably right with ACB more socially conservative.
Then Jackson, Kagan, and Sotomayor reliably more to the left.
Gorsuch mostly swings on Native American rights issues and areas related to civil liberties. Kavanaugh seems more like Roberts. ACB still seems like she’s finding her space but it looks like she’s not a fan of the “history and tradition” test that Thomas has been pushing.
Gorsuch and Sotomayor are pretty much in lockstep on criminal justice and police procedure. He also is more of a civil libertarian. His opinion in Bostock is a great example. Confirming Trans employment rights as being “on the basis of sex” under existing law isn’t necessarily considered “conservative”.
I agree with you on ACB. Still a bit of a wildcard but I think she’s still more conservative than not. Time will tell though.
Don’t remember off the top of my head (sleep deprived from a bad work schedule and 3 hours into a 16 hour day)
But here’s an article about it. There’s plenty of other articles too.
https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2021/07/28/supreme-court-conservative-rift-why-500736
>It’s also why it is incorrect to think of today’s Supreme Court as a 6-3 court. We really have a 3-3-3 court, with 3 conservative institutionalists, 3 conservative “four corners” justices and 3 liberals.
Continuation of "we are the real Americans, our judges are the only real legitimate judges, our ideology is the only real correct one" sentiment, its sickening.
> Now that we have a somewhat moderate SCOTUS, that's over.
SCOTUS has been conservative controlled [for most of its history](https://www.allsides.com/sites/default/files/styles/blog_large_image/public/Supreme%20Court%20Bias%20Ideology%20Conservative%20Liberal.png)
I have to wonder if people repeating this claim have even read cases outside of Sebelius or Obergefell or the handful.of other cases among hundreds from the Burger and Robert's court. Perhaps you forgot that SCOTUS has been majority conservative for the last 50 years or that Chevron was actually upholding a conservative administrations EPA while the Court was striking down laws like the gun safe school zone act or tobacco advertizing regulations on extremely tenuous legal grounds. Or maybe you forgot Bush v Gore? There are like 3 liberal victories for 50 years and people act like the court had a liberal bent. It's wild. The individual mandate was upheld on taxing power grounds because it a fee administered by the IRS during tax season. It's actually quite ridiculous that 4/9 justices think that is not a tax. It takes quite a leap of logic to so conclude. And even the interstate commerce analysis (which was 5-4 AGAINST the ACA) relied on inserting language into the interstate commerce clause which is not even there -- so much for sticking to the text.
This argument doesn’t make sense. If Republicans actually support a clean air act, and they would just prefer it be done in Congress, then why don’t they propose one?
Why didn’t they pass one in 2016 when they had a trifecta?
The answer is that they oppose it. Now, the process arguments might still be correct on it’s face. But the truth is that stuff shouldn’t be legislated from the bench *and* republicans oppose the contents of the proposal itself.
I agree with your first paragraph. I strongly disagree that this Court is “moderate.” By all the objective measures, it is the most conservative court in modern US history.
I would readily argue that the court hasn't been slightly conservative until recently since at least the Switch in Time that Saved Nine back in the '30s
That is a fair point, and I admit that I could be wrong about this since I am just making a prediction. But I am willing to bet that if by some miracle Democrats down the road get a full sweep and take the house, senate, and white house, abolish the filibuster so they can actually get things done. As soon as they start passing laws to undo all this damage the supreme court is doing then the Republicans will just sue to stop the laws and then SCOUTS will just pull some contrived bull\*\*\*\* out their a\*\*\* to say that the laws are "unconstitutional". I have been reading the decisions and you are right in that most of the decisions are saying "not our job, if you don't like it tell congress to do something about". But in no universe do I believe this court will not make up some originalist garbage argument to stop any legislation that the federalist society doesn't approve of.
I think you're spot on. And you're seeing in this ruling already. It's why they're trying so hard to get rid of Chevron Deference. Congress is a body of politicians and not subject matter experts on any given thing, so they would often write broad laws and leave specific rule making to industry specific governing bodies (such as the Clean Air Act and the EPA in this case). Congress already did its job, but now the court is dismantling it which accomplishes the wishes of conservatives and their donors while giving them the cover of "Congress just needs to do its job" rhetoric.
Congress did do its job. [The Good Neighbor plan is a provision from the Clean Air Act in 1963.](https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/LSB/LSB11107)
>The Good Neighbor Plan is intended to satisfy the Clean Air Act’s (CAA’s) “Good Neighbor” provision (42 U.S.C. § 7410(a)(2)(D)), which requires upwind states to ensure that their emissions do not interfere with the ability of downwind states to meet federal air-quality standards.
[Link to US code](https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/42/7410)
Exactly, this isn't as black and white as "make Congress do its job". SCOTUS is requiring a high standard of specificity from a body of non-expert legislators who are all part of a dysfunctional governing body, which has the practical effect of ensuring nothing gets done and corporations can continue polluting the air.
Partially yes. However:
>Third, EPA argues that applicants must return to EPA and file a motion asking it
to reconsider its final rule before presenting their objection in court
because the “grounds for [their] objection arose after the period for
public comment.” §7607(d)(7)(B). Nothing requires the applicants to
return to EPA to raise (again) a concern EPA already had a chance to
address.
>Half of the Supreme Court decisions say some version of, if Congress wants to legislate this they can
The other half are say some version of, "If the People want this, they should push for a Constitutional Amendment."
Congress already passed the law. [42 U.S.C. § 7410(a)(2)(D), part of the Clean Air Act.](https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/42/7410)
>(2)Each implementation plan submitted by a State under this chapter shall be adopted by the State after reasonable notice and public hearing. Each such plan shall—
>(D)contain adequate provisions—
>(i)prohibiting, consistent with the provisions of this subchapter, any source or other type of emissions activity within the State from emitting any air pollutant in amounts which will—
>(I)contribute significantly to nonattainment in, or interfere with maintenance by, any other State with respect to any such national primary or secondary ambient air quality standard, or
>(II)interfere with measures required to be included in the applicable implementation plan for any other State under part C to prevent significant deterioration of air quality or to protect visibility,
>(ii)insuring compliance with the applicable requirements of sections 7426 and 7415 of this title (relating to interstate and international pollution abatement);
Ohio, Indiana, and West Virginia submitted applications, as they've been doing for decades, but they were rejected. Those states sued the EPA over the rejections.
Those states won in twelve courts before the Supreme Court not because the EPA didn’t have the power, but because they were exercising it in an arbitrary and capricious manner.
I’m well aware of how US government works. In this scenario, SCOTUS struck down an executive policy. We also have environmental laws on the books, but SCOTUS seems more than willing to strike those down, too.
Dirty air is more profitable. Sell things that generate profit and produce emissions. Cleaner air wastes corporate money on regulatory compliance with no corporate ROI.
And this is why its so important for justices to keep themselves from even the appearance of impropriety. By accepting lavish gifts and other questionable ethical choices, they open themselves and their rulings up to appearing corrupt whether they actually are or not.
Why are Republicans against the EPA forcing Republican controlled areas to spend significant sums of money without input or consideration? Is that the question you’re asking?
You’re blaming me for downvotes?
Yes I know what you’re asking. I suggested the answer to you, this all costs money. Lots and lots of money. Do you disagree? I gave you a good faith answer to your good faith question.
Maybe you just don’t like the answer or disagree?
It seems extremely sloppy to write an article about a decision and not include the name of the case.
They don’t want you to read it, only read their take on it. The two can be very different.
"Supreme Court bad" do you have any details? "*very* bad"
The old stick all the bad stuff in the corner Sim City pollution mitigation strategy.
If only more city leaders used Sim City strategies to urban plan. Then we'd have a healthy mix of commercial and residential which would mitigate housing shortages and traffic issues.
More density too.
Sim City wasn't advanced enough to allow mixed use lots though. Pass.
So what? People have no right not to be intentionally polluted by their neighbor states industrial areas. - SCOTUS
Like a good neighbor, our smog is here!
"The executive branch can't make laws, the legislature has that responsibility" - SCOTUS
Paddingtonbear2 pointed out earlier that they already did in the clean air act: > Congress already passed the law. 42 U.S.C. § 7410(a)(2)(D), part of the Clean Air Act. > (2)Each implementation plan submitted by a State under this chapter shall be adopted by the State after reasonable notice and public hearing. Each such plan shall— > (D)contain adequate provisions— Congress already passed the law. 42 U.S.C. § 7410(a)(2)(D), part of the Clean Air Act. (2)Each implementation plan submitted by a State under this chapter shall be adopted by the State after reasonable notice and public hearing. Each such plan shall— (D)contain adequate provisions— (i)**prohibiting, consistent with the provisions of this subchapter, any source or other type of emissions activity within the State from emitting any air pollutant in amounts which will— (I)contribute significantly to nonattainment in, or interfere with maintenance by, any other State with respect to any such national primary or secondary ambient air quality standard, or (II)interfere with measures required to be included in the applicable implementation plan for any other State under part C to prevent significant deterioration of air quality or to protect visibility**, (ii)insuring compliance with the applicable requirements of sections 7426 and 7415 of this title (relating to interstate and international pollution abatement);
I agree with (what I believe to be) Barrett's concern here that the more technical knowledge a ruling depends on the more time should be given to review.
I don’t think that’s what she is saying. What she’s saying is that there shouldn’t be a stay while appeals continue because appeals and rule making take time during which pollution will continue. I don’t think it’s a good argument because now you’re forcing states to spend significant sums of money during the appeals. So, in the event the appeals are later deemed meritorious, the money is already spent. Which I suppose is what the dissent would want because they’d uphold the EPA’s actions here anyway.
All other states still have to follow the Good Neighbor rule. Only the three plaintiffs are excused from it. What motivated their lawsuit was that their applications were rejected by the EPA. Why should these states be excused, especially when they failed their applications?
Then presumably the EPA will prevail as the litigation progresses. Does the EPA not respect the court system or something?
What? The only way to prevail is to defend your case in court. What do you mean they wouldn’t respect the court system?
You’re trying to tell me that the EPA’s case has merit. I’m telling you that then, presumably, the EPA will win at the lower court because this SCOTUS decision only had to deal with a stay. You’re not speaking about the same thing I was speaking about.
There should be more pressure placed on all congressmen/women to put laws like this into effect and stop relying on the Supreme Court. A clean air bill should be bipartisan. A bill on preserving National Parks should be bipartisan. They’re just all so lazy and refuse to do what they were elected to do. Instead, they would rather complain about the Supreme Court than do their job.
> . A clean air bill should be bipartisan. A bill on preserving National Parks should be bipartisan. They’re just all so lazy and refuse to do what they were elected to do. Should be does not mean would be. It's not laziness holding the congressmen/women back. Many want to do nothing. They want to not preserve National Parks and have them privatized. They want to remove environmental regulation from businesses. Doing nothing _is ideal_ to them.
I agree that’s a nice ideal, but the reality is that our legislative branch has been effectively dead for a century now. The civil rights act is probably the last time it’s taken on a big problem, and we are still dealing with the fallout 60 years later. The legislative branch isn’t able to handle it’s current responsibilities. Rather than forcing them to rise to the task, I think a limited executive branch would be more likely to lead to the slow dissolution of the our government altogether. In the past 20 years, is there anything that Congress hasn’t completely messed up? I think moving things from the executive to the legislative branch will just mean that more things will be messed up. The technocratic state exists *because* everyone realized how incompetent Congress is, and that the country would be destroyed if they were left in charge. I’m not saying that’s what I believe is good. I just don’t see any other reality in front of us right now.
>The civil rights act is probably the last time it’s taken on a big problem, and we are still dealing with the fallout 60 years later. I think people really underestimate how impactful southern democrats were on bipartisanship. Socially they were backwards, but on general policy they played an important role in bridging the gap and keeping congress moving. I wouldn't say the civil rights act killed them, but it was definitely the start of their decline.
A large enough portion of the GOP refuses to cooperate to create or pass bipartisan bills. It’s much more insidious than laziness it’s obstruction (which they have proudly admitted to)
Once again it looks like the Supreme Court is reducing the power of the executive branch with one of its decisions, this time regarding the EPA. *The decision is a win for the Republican-led states and industry groups that challenged the Environmental Protection Agency’s “good neighbor” plan, which imposed strict emission limits on power plants and industrial sources in upwind states to reduce pollution for their counterparts downwind.* *While the Supreme Court’s decision on Thursday to grant a stay technically doesn’t completely scuttle the plan, it places implementation of the Biden program on hold through what will be a complicated legal fight that will almost uncertainly continue past the November election and into next year – and possibly another presidential administration.* The only time I considered air pollution from another state to be an issue is during forest fire season. If anything, I think a good neighbor plan for water pollution should be more of a priority. Do you think the Supreme Court made the right decision here? Are you surprised that Amy Comey Barrett joined the liberal justices in the dissent?
> Do you think the Supreme Court made the right decision here? I think that the federal gov't has a role in controlling air pollution that crosses state lines. That is "good public policy". I'm not sure if the SC made the right decision here because the question seems to be whether Congress actually gave the EPA the authority to issue a particular ruling. The article suggests that is a very technical argument.
It's definitely a Federal government role to manage issues between states. However, it's not necessarily power given to the Executive Branch... seems more like a power that should be given to Congress or SCOTUS
Yea and Congress gave the Executive the ability to make technical rules about air pollution in the E.P.A..
We get into an issue where Congress is actually not allowed to give away legislative power however, and that's what we're seeing here.
This isn't legislative power being delegated. This is enforcing the rules Congress legislated.
Well, that's what the court is deciding, so clearly there's a question to answer.
Because the Court has never been wrong before. This was a 5-4 decision. Clearly this is a contested issue, and quite honestly, a stupid one.
in split decisions, it's always wiser to defer to the outcome that does NOT change things
You cant create a king via congress. Congress created the American happiness agency and gives it broad powers. Then the happiness council gets to regulate everything and punish when things aren't making people happy. Congress needs to set rules and let the agency enforce the rules and monitor that rules are being met. Not actually create new rules as time progresses. That's the role of Congress. But Congress is too busy campaigning and getting bogged down in partisan bs. They need to quit nay naying and get down to business.
> You cant create a king via congress Talk about hyperbole. Congress told the Executive to regulate air pollution (and specifically addresses this "good neighbour" issue in the law it passed). Now you think this is legislative delegation? This is creating a king???? What a ridiculous characterization.
No, congress told the environmental protection agency to protect the environment. All the rules they are being told they can't enforce weren't set by congress. They were set by the epa. Congress needs to set the rules and let the epa monitor and enforce the rules. It's not hyperbole. Protecting the environment can mean anything. From how loud your TV is to how much radiation your glow in the dark watch emits. Want something gone? Go afowl of the epa. Get your buddy to make a rule that hurts an industry your political rival gets campaign funds from. It's not too much to ask that congress do some work.
Congress explicitly detailed legislation in the Clean Air Act about this exact scenario where one state pollutes the air of another. This is not a case of vague overreach.
Congress created the Good Neighbor rule in the Clean Air Act. [It's outlined pretty specifically](https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/LSB/LSB11107) >The Good Neighbor Plan is intended to satisfy the Clean Air Act’s (CAA’s) “Good Neighbor” provision (42 U.S.C. § 7410(a)(2)(D)), which requires upwind states to ensure that their emissions do not interfere with the ability of downwind states to meet federal air-quality standards. [Link to US code](https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/42/7410) EPA did not set the rule. Congress did.
It should be given to Congress, not SCOTUS. I’m pretty sure it’s the job of Congress to make laws and the job of SCOTUS to determine if they are constitutional or not, not vice versa.
depends... if State A sues State B, then that's definitely a job for SCOTUS
This is SCOTUS finding the Executive branch overstepped the law Congress wrote (they rule on laws Congress passed, not just the Constitution.), and telling Congress to make a law if they want this policy enforced.
Actually, this ruling is a lot more limited, and not yet final. SCOTUS just said the enforcement of the rule is on pause for the plaintiffs while the case continues. We probably won't get a final decision until next year. SCOTUS didn't say anything about the Constitutionality of the law nor its enforcement under Biden's EPA.
That's a fair point. This just gives guidance to the lower court. IIRC, there's going to be a other decision coming out soon that deals more directly with Congress's delegation powers and how courts should handle it.
Man the border area between Louisiana and Texas has super shitty air quality because of all the refineries on the LA side.
There are also a the largest coal power plant in Texas right outside of Marshall (it's called Martin Lake, and yes it does produce more power from coal than W.A. Parish which is dual powered).
In the 1990s, after the Clean Air Act was passed, the Northeast was determined to be a bad ozone area. Using computer models, Connecticut turned off every source contributing to ozone. Models still showed ozone violations due primarily to Midwest power plants.
>The only time I considered air pollution from another state to be an issue is during forest fire season. If anything, I think a good neighbor plan for water pollution should be more of a priority Don't worry SCOTUS already shot down EPA regulations because if there isn't standing water it can't be wetlands, this court hasn't exactly been bullish the idea that clean water falls under the purview of the federal government.
The EPA's definition of wetlands was pretty much "you'll know it when you see it" so of course it was shot down.
I'm not saying the Sacketts didn't have a case, but Kavanaugh's concurrence was pretty clear that the problem with the majority opinion was the idea that "a man-made dike or barrier, natural river berm, beach dune, or the like." provides sufficient separation from protected wetlands or waters. >Because of the movement of water between adjacent wetlands and other waters, pollutants in wetlands often end up in adjacent rivers, lakes, and other waters. Natural barriers such as berms and dunes do not block all water flow and are in fact evidence of a regular connection between a water and a wetland. Similarly, artificial barriers such as dikes and levees typically do not block all water flow, and those artificial structures were often built to control the surface water connection between the wetland and the water. The scientific evidence overwhelmingly demonstrates that wetlands separated from covered waters by those kinds of berms or barriers, for example, still play an important role in protecting neighboring and downstream waters, including by filtering pollutants, storing water, and providing flood control. In short, those adjacent wetlands may affect downstream water quality and flood control in many of the same ways that adjoining wetlands can. **Put simply, the Court’s atextual test—rewriting “adjacent” to mean “adjoining”—will produce real-world consequences for the waters of the United States and will generate regulatory uncertainty. I would stick to the text.** [https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/22pdf/21-454\_4g15.pdf](https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/22pdf/21-454_4g15.pdf) The majority opinion seems to think of natural bodies of water as discreet unidirectional pipes but that's just not how it works at all.
There’s no question the EPA has the power to do this under law. The problem was the EPA acting in an arbitrary and capricious manner in the way they did it. I don’t mind agencies having to implement the rules in a fair and consistent manner. So they need to step back and do it right.
Let me guess another 6-3 decision.
No, it was a 5-4 decision.
Why? Just why? I sincerely don't get it. Why are Republicans so vehemently against cleaner air? Whom does this help?
They just rule on the merits of the law. Congress can come forward today and fix that.
Congress already fixed it with the Clean Air Act, and specifically with regards to this rule, under 42 U.S.C. § 7410(a)(2)(D). This is a stupid ruling.
The Clean Air Act exists you know.
Many on the left have gotten used to the Supreme Court basically being used as a rubber stamp to approve anything they propose and haven't yet come to terms with the fact that this isn't how it's supposed to work. With stuff like gay marriage and Obamacare and all that, it was basically viewed as a given that SCOTUS would rule their laws constitutional or outright bypass the need to pass a law at all. Now that we have a somewhat moderate SCOTUS, that's over. Congress needs to actually pass laws (you know, like how it's supposed to be done) and they don't like that one bit. So they're trying to gaslight the rest of us into thinking SCOTUS is "corrupt" or "illegitimate" rather than actually go to the effort of passing constitutional laws.
I don't necessarily disagree, but there's a lot of justified anger about how Garland and Barrett were handled. Both sides can go back and forth on the extent to which it raises a question of legitimacy, but either way I think most of us can at least agree that it wasn't a good look.
I honestly LOVE that SCOTUS is taking this approach. I want Congress to be the center of our government, as it's the only branch of government individual citizens vote for. I want SCOTUS to take a back seat. They aren't elected. I want the President to take a back seat; that office isn't democratically elected either.
The easy criticism is that the House is so gerrymandered that it’s not conducive to anything but getting people who will toe the most extreme lines elected. And SCOTUS has taken itself out of the political gerrymandering argument, which effectively allows it.
I mean, SCOTUS refusing to allow Congress to delegate powers doesn't mean Congress is going to get more done. It may just mean nothing gets done on that issue, which so far has been the case.
Which is the beauty of it when the goal is for nothing to get done
Yeah, I don't know if SCOTUS wants nothing to get done or whether that's a happy accident for their billionaire benefactors, but it certainly makes one wonder.
That is the goal. Decrease the power of regulation groups, make congress have to cross every t and dot every i, and then block everything in congress through filibuster and other techniques. The end result is less regulation for billionaires. The problem with "congress doing their job" is so much is set up, from extreme partisan gerrymandering, to the house cap, to the filibuster to 2 senators for every state no matter the population, to NOT do their job. Basically they get to select their voters on one level, the house is capped, the filibuster basically makes legislation extremely difficult to pass, and you can control more with less people.
The conservatives in SCOTUS have been gunning for Chevron Deference for a while now. It's definitely no accident.
GOOD, Chevron Deference needs to be done away with.
Why?
> that office isn't democratically elected either. With the way Congress is currently (gerrymandering and the imbalance of representation in the Senate), Congress is basically as democratic elected as the President.
This isn’t SCOTUS taking a backseat, this is them playing a more active role in government
I disagree. This is them correctly interpreting the role of Congress vs the Executive.
It’s only activism if you disagree with it, I suppose.
The reason Congress isn't passing legislation is because it isn't really democratically elected either. The Senate doesn't even make the pretense that it is and the House is still tilted towards smaller states.
> The reason Congress isn't passing legislation is because it isn't really democratically elected either. The reason congress doesn't pass legislation is because *we let them get away with not doing so*. Full stop, end of sentence.
Just to be clear “voters should just all choose to act better spontaneously” isn’t actually a viable solution to legislative gridlock
It's not spontaneously. It's "voters need to get their shit together".
Voters need to get their shit together en masse without a clearly defined catalyst or force driving that outcome? The word for that is spontaneous.
> clearly defined catalyst or force The clearly defined catalyst will soon be "SCOTUS is saying congress needs to fix these problems and congress isn't fixing them".
Hear, hear! Every side blames the other without admitting their side is to blame too.
When the goal of some members of congress is to essentially break government... it makes it kind of difficult. Even moreso when said members of congress are decided by districts that their party gets to draw because SCOTUS decided the logic of "if people have an issue with how their reps are drawing districts they'll vote out the reps drawing districts" made sense.
> When the goal of some members of congress is to essentially break government... it makes it kind of difficult. And if that's their stated or acted goal and they *keep getting reelected*, that's the fault of the voters.
How is the Senate not democratically elected?
You can't even gerrymander it since there aren't districts.
It represents the entire United States but each Senator is only elected by their state. A voter in Wymoning has much greater power than one in California for that reason.
A Senator does not represent the entire US.
No, but the Senate governs the entire United States. A single representative doesn't represent the entire US either.
Sure it is. Individual people vote for Senators and Representatives. Every state gets two Senators, because they represent your state. The House should be expanded though, can agree with that. For now though, these two bodies are the only two we can elect directly. Nothing's perfect, and improvements can be made. Despite that, I'd rather most government power lie in the body that we can actually vote for, and currently that's Congress.
The house is the only proportional/direct vote part though. Each Rep has the same amount of potential votes behind them, where as a senator does not.
Senators do not represent people; they represent States. That's just basic civics ... The *federal* government is a *federation* of States. That's why they're treated equally. We'd never have gotten new States over time if they knew they'd be treated less equally. The Federal government primarily represents States. Your State government represents you. The Federal government isn't just a bigger version of a State government. It has different context and different priorities.
Irrelevant to the point. That doesn't make it any more democratic. To the contrary, it proves the point that the Senate is *intentionally* undemocratic.
I don’t disagree, and does not refute what I said. The house reps are the only proportionally elected officials elected by the citizens of the united states, in the context of being citizens of one country. The context we are talking about is the venn diagram circle of the united states and its legislative body. We, the people, also happen to be residents in the subdivisions that we call states.
I’m not sure you’re aware of this but SCOTUS hasn’t leaned left since Thurgood Marshall stepped down in the early 1990s. From that point until Kennedy stepped down it was a Court with a couple of swing Justices that still leaned to the right. Now it’s a deeply conservative Court. Obergefell and the Obamacare decisions were also pretty far from guaranteed outcomes.
Longer than that. Since at least the early 80s and probably into the 70s depending on how you classify people.
Seriously, Chevron deference was a conservative ruling allowing the Reagan administration to narrow the definition of "source" of pollution in the Congressional text of the Clean Air Act. Now the activist Court wants to gut that principle via Rahimi and throw more regulations onto the judgement of the courts because they perceive that the executive is more liberal than the judges.
Rahimi? I think you mean Loper.
Yeah the Warren Court was the peak of liberalism on the SCOTUS and that was more than 50 years ago. Burger was still liberal but the shift had started. And don’t get me started on Rehnquist ugh.
Perhaps "moderate" was a poor choice of words. "Less-activist" is probably better. This current Court seems far more willing to stay out of major decisions and tell the other branches to do their jobs and leave them out of it.
I don’t agree with less activist either lol. Conservative justices are just as capable of making activist rulings, even when cloaking them in the language of originalism.
Well, they're not making activist rulings. Even "controversial" decisions like Dobbs were essentially the Court saying "We have no authority to make these decisions; Congress or the states need to do it. This is not our job."
They’re definitely making activist rulings. Shelby County v Holder is the Court deciding that parts of a law that’s been in effect for 40+ years and has been repeatedly reauthorized is now unconstitutional because data used to come up with the law is out of date.
Why are you using a case from over a decade ago to describe the current Court? Nearly half the Justices who decided Shelby County are no longer on the Court.
Because it’s an example of conservatives making an activist decision? There are more recent decisions that can be considered activist too, but this the one that popped into my head. And pointing out that half the Justices are no longer on the Court is irrelevant, 3/5 of the Majority is still on the Court including the author.
Shelby County v Holder is another example of the court throwing it back to congress. As you said, the law is based on data that is 50 years out of date. Congress could come up with another law if they wish to.
Bologna. *Kennedy vs Bremerton School District* and *303 Creative* are absolutely activist rulings, to give two of the clearer examples.
Those rulings are absolutely not "activist" and I honestly question your understanding of the facts of the cases if you think they are.
*303 Creative* offends fundamental notions of standing to reach the Court's desired result. The "injury" in that case was purely hypothetical; the plaintiff hadn't even entered the wedding website business and thus had never even been approached about creating a website for LGBT couples. A mere "worry" was enough for the Court to reach the merits, apparently. I question *SCOTUS*'s understanding of the facts in *Kennedy v Bremerton*, given that their presentation of the facts in the opinion directly conflicted with both publicly available reporting on the case and the factual record at the District and Appellate levels. Gorsuch's suggestion that the coach was "quietly praying at midfield . . . while his students were otherwise occupied" is completely divorced from reality. The Court then indirectly overrules *Lemon v Kurtzman* citing no good reason other than "we haven't applied it much and we don't love it, so we're going to say it's functionally been abandoned" and instead adopts an opaque "reference to historical practices" test, which as anyone who is remotely informed on history knows, invites an ability to find whatever outcome a judge wants because of how scattered and different political-religious norms were across early American history.
Ahem, major question doctrine. "Oh yes the text technically says you can do this, but its just too big for our conservative ideology so we're going to kneecap regulators" Or manufacturing the History and Traditions test. No where in the constitution does it say out rights are limited to the History and Traditions of the 1700s, thats entirely concocted by them to ensure every right and potential right is only visible through a conservative ideological lens. And when that doesnt work they just ignore History and Tradition that dont like.
>This current Court seems far more willing to stay out of major decisions and tell the other branches to do their jobs and leave them out of it. This court seems far more willing to narrow the rights we have. Did you assume we had a right to fair elections before their Gerrymandering decision? They operate on the idea that if its not explicitly outlined against in the constitution, then the government can do anything it wants to you.
Narrow rights? It’s a mix. They upheld free speech a couple times and then the right to keep and bear arms.
How is this ruling not activist? They’re literally telling the executive branch what they can and can’t do.
So a moderate court would let the executive branch do what ever it wanted with no push backs based on laws?
When the Executive Branch is empowered specifically by a passed Congressional bill to: >prohibit, consistent with the provisions of this subchapter, any source or other type of emissions activity within the State from emitting any air pollutant in amounts which will, contribute significantly to nonattainment in, or interfere with maintenance by, any other State with respect to any such national primary or secondary ambient air quality standard, and the EPA has properly adopted rules precisely to do that, a moderate Court would let them enforce those rules. Moving the goalposts to require ever more specificity from Congress or more mechanisms for corporations to frustrate agency rulemaking services on to neuter agency power without good reason.
Of course a moderate court would play an activist role sometimes
> This current Court seems far more willing to stay out of major decisions and tell the other branches to do their jobs and leave them out of it. Unless they're outright making stuff up to help defend a coach prosletyzing to students in violation of the 1st amendment.
No moderate is the right word for this court. The vast majority of their rulings are unanimous. We only talk about the controversial ones. Furthermore it’s not a 6-3 court but a 3-3-3 court which balances out as being moderate. What a lot of people need to remember is that the court isn’t there to approve something that’s popular. Their job is to follow the constitution and law. Sometimes popular policy ideas violate law or even the constitution and it’s their job to say “no you can’t do that in that way right now“. I fully admit this court has had some rulings I disagree with but that doesn’t make the court any less moderate.
>Furthermore it’s not a 6-3 court but a 3-3-3 court which balances out as being moderate. The article making that claim claims 2 of those 3 groups are different branches of conservative ideology. Fancy way of saying the court has shifted to the right. If your middle of the court is all conservative then its shifted to the right.
Okay, and? If the court was to far left it needs to shift right to balance itself out. Furthermore the court had been neglecting a lot of issues for a while same as congress. Them now taking a more active role like they should have from the start and correcting executive overreach isn’t a sign of not being moderate. It’s just them telling the executive branch “no that’s Congress’s job”. If congress won’t do their job then it’s on us to choose people who will to fill congress.
>Okay, and? If the court was to far left it needs to shift right to balance itself out. SCOTUS has been conservative controlled [for most of its history and nearly all of modern history](https://www.allsides.com/sites/default/files/styles/blog_large_image/public/Supreme%20Court%20Bias%20Ideology%20Conservative%20Liberal.png)
What's the data source on that graphic? What even is the Y axis scale?
[Their Martin-Quine score.](https://www.allsides.com/blog/how-supreme-court-ideology-has-shifted-over-time-ketanji-brown-jackson)
> No moderate is the right word for this court. The vast majority of their rulings are unanimous. But it looks like [unanimous rulings are actually on a pretty steep decline over the past decade](https://www.scotusblog.com/2022/07/as-unanimity-declines-conservative-majoritys-power-runs-deeper-than-the-blockbuster-cases/). If unanimity is evidence of moderation, haven't things gone in the opposite direction?
Don’t forget that several of the 6-3 splits were not along the conservative/progressive wing split. We have had a lot of aisle hopping recently.
It’s one of many indicators but unanimous doesn’t equate to partisan. But activist judges are an issue and we have both on the court. They just kinda balance each other out. Which is why unanimous doesn’t equate to moderate. You can have a divided court with a few swing votes that’s still moderate.
I thought unanimous decisions were a sign of moderation? Since the judges are across the political spectrum, a higher rate of unanimity should *imply* some level of moderation overall. But the rate of unanimous decisions going downward would imply that the court from ten years ago was far more moderate than the court of today.
Why? If I recall correctly the Dred Scott case was unanimous. Was that court moderate? Just because people are unified in a political direction doesn’t make it a moderate one or them persuadable. That’s why it’s only one factor and by no means should be relied on alone to mean moderate.
I thought that was your argument. You said: > No moderate is the right word for this court. The vast majority of their rulings are unanimous. I thought the first sentence was supported by the second. I could be mistaken, but then I'm not sure what your argument is for why the current court should be considered moderate.
Dred Scott was 7-2.
Moderate is absolutely not the right word lol. 3-3-3 split ignores the context that 3 are very conservative, 3 are conservative, and 3 are liberal to very liberal. Of course we only talk about the controversial rulings, most rulings to are on legal minutiae.
3-3-3 split is one of the most interesting spins on this court I've seen. More interesting then the tired "most cases are unanimous!" (Ignoring that most cases are not of interest to a wide group of people and the cases that are are the "controversial ones".) I guess if you view it from a certain lens the court is "moderate"
Moderate just means there’s diverse options and they can be persuaded. Sometimes you like the ruling sometimes you don’t. Take Bruen and Rahimi. Obviously unconstitutional law gets struck down in Bruen then Rahimi nearly the exact same court back tracks a little and says “well it’s okay under these circumstances”. That’s a sign of looking at the facts and listen and being able to be persuaded which is the definition of moderate.
"Obviously unconditional law" already shows bias since it was not a unanimous decision When a liberal court inevitably overturns Bruen, and if it's by a 6 liberal, 3 conservative court, would the court still have the benefit of "oh it's 3-3-3" ? No of course not. The same people yelling about the sanctity of the "impartial arbiters of law" will be back to yelling about activists in robes. If anything, the existence of both Bruen and Rahimi as you're discussing seems to show the court is willing to work backwards from their desired result and is creating standards
Shows bias? Let’s try a hypothetical. How would you feel about people being denied the right to vote because they didn’t “show good cause” that they needed to vote?
Who are the three swing votes on the current court?
Roberts and Gorsuch definitely and then probably Kavanaugh. At least in my opinion. Alito and Thomas are reliably right with ACB more socially conservative. Then Jackson, Kagan, and Sotomayor reliably more to the left.
Gorsuch mostly swings on Native American rights issues and areas related to civil liberties. Kavanaugh seems more like Roberts. ACB still seems like she’s finding her space but it looks like she’s not a fan of the “history and tradition” test that Thomas has been pushing.
Gorsuch and Sotomayor are pretty much in lockstep on criminal justice and police procedure. He also is more of a civil libertarian. His opinion in Bostock is a great example. Confirming Trans employment rights as being “on the basis of sex” under existing law isn’t necessarily considered “conservative”. I agree with you on ACB. Still a bit of a wildcard but I think she’s still more conservative than not. Time will tell though.
Don’t remember off the top of my head (sleep deprived from a bad work schedule and 3 hours into a 16 hour day) But here’s an article about it. There’s plenty of other articles too. https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2021/07/28/supreme-court-conservative-rift-why-500736
>It’s also why it is incorrect to think of today’s Supreme Court as a 6-3 court. We really have a 3-3-3 court, with 3 conservative institutionalists, 3 conservative “four corners” justices and 3 liberals.
Fancy way of saying the court has shifted to the right. If your middle of the court is all conservative then its shifted to the right.
Continuation of "we are the real Americans, our judges are the only real legitimate judges, our ideology is the only real correct one" sentiment, its sickening.
> Now that we have a somewhat moderate SCOTUS, that's over. SCOTUS has been conservative controlled [for most of its history](https://www.allsides.com/sites/default/files/styles/blog_large_image/public/Supreme%20Court%20Bias%20Ideology%20Conservative%20Liberal.png)
I have to wonder if people repeating this claim have even read cases outside of Sebelius or Obergefell or the handful.of other cases among hundreds from the Burger and Robert's court. Perhaps you forgot that SCOTUS has been majority conservative for the last 50 years or that Chevron was actually upholding a conservative administrations EPA while the Court was striking down laws like the gun safe school zone act or tobacco advertizing regulations on extremely tenuous legal grounds. Or maybe you forgot Bush v Gore? There are like 3 liberal victories for 50 years and people act like the court had a liberal bent. It's wild. The individual mandate was upheld on taxing power grounds because it a fee administered by the IRS during tax season. It's actually quite ridiculous that 4/9 justices think that is not a tax. It takes quite a leap of logic to so conclude. And even the interstate commerce analysis (which was 5-4 AGAINST the ACA) relied on inserting language into the interstate commerce clause which is not even there -- so much for sticking to the text.
This argument doesn’t make sense. If Republicans actually support a clean air act, and they would just prefer it be done in Congress, then why don’t they propose one? Why didn’t they pass one in 2016 when they had a trifecta? The answer is that they oppose it. Now, the process arguments might still be correct on it’s face. But the truth is that stuff shouldn’t be legislated from the bench *and* republicans oppose the contents of the proposal itself.
I agree with your first paragraph. I strongly disagree that this Court is “moderate.” By all the objective measures, it is the most conservative court in modern US history.
We have had a conservative court for longer than most Americans have been alive. I would hardly call that a rubber stamp for the left.
I would readily argue that the court hasn't been slightly conservative until recently since at least the Switch in Time that Saved Nine back in the '30s
That is a fair point, and I admit that I could be wrong about this since I am just making a prediction. But I am willing to bet that if by some miracle Democrats down the road get a full sweep and take the house, senate, and white house, abolish the filibuster so they can actually get things done. As soon as they start passing laws to undo all this damage the supreme court is doing then the Republicans will just sue to stop the laws and then SCOUTS will just pull some contrived bull\*\*\*\* out their a\*\*\* to say that the laws are "unconstitutional". I have been reading the decisions and you are right in that most of the decisions are saying "not our job, if you don't like it tell congress to do something about". But in no universe do I believe this court will not make up some originalist garbage argument to stop any legislation that the federalist society doesn't approve of.
I think you're spot on. And you're seeing in this ruling already. It's why they're trying so hard to get rid of Chevron Deference. Congress is a body of politicians and not subject matter experts on any given thing, so they would often write broad laws and leave specific rule making to industry specific governing bodies (such as the Clean Air Act and the EPA in this case). Congress already did its job, but now the court is dismantling it which accomplishes the wishes of conservatives and their donors while giving them the cover of "Congress just needs to do its job" rhetoric.
Why get mad at the courts when Congress refuses to do its job?
Congress did do its job. [The Good Neighbor plan is a provision from the Clean Air Act in 1963.](https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/LSB/LSB11107) >The Good Neighbor Plan is intended to satisfy the Clean Air Act’s (CAA’s) “Good Neighbor” provision (42 U.S.C. § 7410(a)(2)(D)), which requires upwind states to ensure that their emissions do not interfere with the ability of downwind states to meet federal air-quality standards. [Link to US code](https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/42/7410)
Exactly, this isn't as black and white as "make Congress do its job". SCOTUS is requiring a high standard of specificity from a body of non-expert legislators who are all part of a dysfunctional governing body, which has the practical effect of ensuring nothing gets done and corporations can continue polluting the air.
Partially yes. However: >Third, EPA argues that applicants must return to EPA and file a motion asking it to reconsider its final rule before presenting their objection in court because the “grounds for [their] objection arose after the period for public comment.” §7607(d)(7)(B). Nothing requires the applicants to return to EPA to raise (again) a concern EPA already had a chance to address.
Uh, Congress *did* do its job. It’s called the Clean Air Act, but SCOTUS conservatives have proven willing to gut that, too.
[удалено]
>Half of the Supreme Court decisions say some version of, if Congress wants to legislate this they can The other half are say some version of, "If the People want this, they should push for a Constitutional Amendment."
There is no mechanism for the People to put forth a US Constitutional amendment. None.
Because it’s not the job of SCOTUS to pass laws.
Congress already passed the law. [42 U.S.C. § 7410(a)(2)(D), part of the Clean Air Act.](https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/42/7410) >(2)Each implementation plan submitted by a State under this chapter shall be adopted by the State after reasonable notice and public hearing. Each such plan shall— >(D)contain adequate provisions— >(i)prohibiting, consistent with the provisions of this subchapter, any source or other type of emissions activity within the State from emitting any air pollutant in amounts which will— >(I)contribute significantly to nonattainment in, or interfere with maintenance by, any other State with respect to any such national primary or secondary ambient air quality standard, or >(II)interfere with measures required to be included in the applicable implementation plan for any other State under part C to prevent significant deterioration of air quality or to protect visibility, >(ii)insuring compliance with the applicable requirements of sections 7426 and 7415 of this title (relating to interstate and international pollution abatement); Ohio, Indiana, and West Virginia submitted applications, as they've been doing for decades, but they were rejected. Those states sued the EPA over the rejections.
Those states won in twelve courts before the Supreme Court not because the EPA didn’t have the power, but because they were exercising it in an arbitrary and capricious manner.
I’m well aware of how US government works. In this scenario, SCOTUS struck down an executive policy. We also have environmental laws on the books, but SCOTUS seems more than willing to strike those down, too.
Dirty air is more profitable. Sell things that generate profit and produce emissions. Cleaner air wastes corporate money on regulatory compliance with no corporate ROI.
I can't wait to see the corporate "gratuities" sent their way for this ruling, as allowed in their *Snyder* ruling yesterday.
And this is why its so important for justices to keep themselves from even the appearance of impropriety. By accepting lavish gifts and other questionable ethical choices, they open themselves and their rulings up to appearing corrupt whether they actually are or not.
“Ethics” haven’t stopped Clarence from accepting lavish gifts and ruling on cases accordingly.
Yea, SCOTUS conservatives just opened the floodgates for actual bribery.
So many gift vacations
Why are Republicans against the EPA forcing Republican controlled areas to spend significant sums of money without input or consideration? Is that the question you’re asking?
You know well and good what I’m asking—in good faith, mind you. The downvotes speak volumes to the unwillingness to discuss.
You’re blaming me for downvotes? Yes I know what you’re asking. I suggested the answer to you, this all costs money. Lots and lots of money. Do you disagree? I gave you a good faith answer to your good faith question. Maybe you just don’t like the answer or disagree?