Bright Enterprises, a Cape May fishing company, is making legal waves in the U.S. Supreme Court over being ordered to pay up to $700 a day for federal monitors who go out with fishing boats to make sure they follow rules and quotas. The company claimed it can’t afford the cost and sued, backed by significant legal firepower from a conservative group. The high court heard their arguments on Wednesday.
“Commercial fishing is hard, space onboard vehicle vessels is tight, and margins are tighter still,” said attorney Paul Clement. “Therefore, for my clients, having to carry federal observers onboard is a burden, but having to pay their salaries is a crippling blow.”
Clement is with the Cause of Action Institute, which argued that Congress never intended herring fishermen to pay big bucks for monitors when it passed laws to safeguard fisheries. It seeks not just relief for these fishermen but also to scrap a long-standing legal doctrine called Chevron — which advises courts to defer to federal agencies when arguments arise over how to best interpret ambiguities in the law. Clement called it inherently political, because new administrations can push new rules every four years, making agencies flip-flop on regulations to suit political objectives.
But Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar said Congress can’t always foresee every legal question that might arise. That’s where Chevron can offer common-sense guidance.
The Supreme Court hasn’t cited Chevron in its decisions since 2016, and observers expect the court’s conservative majority could seek a major overhaul, if not overturning the doctrine outright.
However, Rutgers University law professor Adam Crews said, “I would be shocked to have Chevron overruled outright, especially to the extent of the court saying something like it’s never appropriate to give deference to an agency.
“I think even the Chevron skeptics were acknowledging that it’s impossible really to imagine a world where there’s not, at the very least, some sort of special consideration or special weight that’s given to what the government says,” Crews said.
The justices asked if overturning Chevron could open legal floodgates and disrupt government regulations, affecting how agencies set policy. Prelogar predicted it would shift power from federal agencies to the courts and launch thousands of appeals.
The fishermen’s attorney argued that properly settled cases would remain intact.
The Supreme Court is expected to rule by early summer.
