At first glance, Atlantic fishermen might not appear to be in the same boat as those fighting for freedom from ever-increasing government overreach. Yet a flawed legal precedent, known as the Chevron doctrine, has surrounded fishermen in a sea of government red tape. Alarmingly, this same precedent threatens to drag everyone from electricians to engineers to bankers under, as well. But if oral arguments at the Supreme Court this month are any indicator, there is reason to hope.
Like many small businesses, fishermen have been bracing against the administrative state’s expanding reach for four decades. The high court unleashed the Chevron doctrine in a 1984 decision, snatching away all lower courts’ authority to interpret ambiguous federal laws and placing it in the hands of unelected federal bureaucrats, including those employed by the National Marine Fisheries Service.
Wielding raw power and answerable to no one, NMFS has become a threat to fishermen’s livelihoods. In 2018, for example, it suddenly demanded that Atlantic herring fishermen pay federal inspectors more than $700 per day to board their boats and monitor for potential overfishing. The agency imposed these hefty fees without any legal oversight or congressional authorization. Now fishermen are imploring the high court to reconsider the ruling that bestowed NMFS and other agencies with such sweeping power.
As the executive director of the Faith and Freedom Coalition, one of America’s leading organizations championing individual liberty and civic values, I understand the vital importance of overturning the Chevron doctrine. Under its power, more than 430 administrative agencies, 2.85 million civilian government employees, and 18.8 million state and local agency employees have used their unprecedented dominion to wreak regulatory havoc, squash personal freedom, and impose debilitating fines upon American business owners and their families.
The Chevron doctrine’s assertion of “agency dominance” is just one of its many dangerous pitfalls. “The Founders expected that the Federal Government’s powers would remain separated — and the people’s liberty secure — only if the branches could check each other,” Justice Clarence Thomas wrote in 2020. “Perhaps worst of all,” he lamented, “Chevron deference undermines the ability of the Judiciary to perform its checking function on the other branches.” In other words, by endowing administrative agencies with so much unconstitutional power, Chevron U.S.A., Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc. creates the precise threat to liberty the founders sought to avoid.
By virtue of the federal Article III courts abdicating their role in the policymaking process through too much deference under Chevron, America has been subject to ludicrous assertions of power by the executive estate and a regulatory whipsaw every time a new administration has come into office. Ultimately, Chevron deference has been a boon for the entrenched federal bureaucracy, but a reinvigorated Article III judiciary could be the antidote for much of that.
One of the most disturbing cases is that of Kelvin Cochran, an Atlanta fire chief and former fire administrator in the Obama administration, who experienced religious discrimination at the hands of Big Government. In 2015, he was fired by the mayor of Atlanta for writing a Bible study book for his church in his personal time. The city relied on the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission’s workplace standards to push him out of service.
Likewise, the Department of Health and Human Services attempted to force religious adoption and foster care ministries to offer their services to same-sex couples, regardless of the agencies’ beliefs about marriage. The examples go on and on, proving without a doubt that overturning Chevron and dismantling agency sovereignty would be a massive victory for all — excluding power-hungry bureaucrats, of course.
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In fact, some see Chevron’s hoped-for demise as an even bigger blow to government overreach than the court’s monumental decision to overturn Roe v. Wade. At the very least, those who applauded Roe’s overturn, including Faith and Freedom Coalition members, should be just as ecstatic about a decision to protect their individual freedoms of speech, assembly, religion, and more from federal attacks.
The fishermen’s plight provides a historic opportunity to strike at the root of regulatory corruption, unleash individual freedom, and restore legal interpretation to its rightful place: the impartial court of law. This case has significant implications for everyone’s liberties. Many will remain on the edge of their seats as we await the court’s final decision. It’s high time to put Chevron out to sea.
Timothy Head is the executive director of the Faith & Freedom Coalition.