Today at Townhall.com Tom Knighton reports that the Firearms Policy Coalition Takes to Court to Argue Only Congress Can Create Laws. This has been a hobby horse of mine for as long as this blog has been running. The Constitution sets clear limits to the powers of each of the three branches of government. Congress makes the law, and the Executive branches...well executes the laws. If you are in an executive agency, you are not asked whether you agree with the law or not, or if you think the law should be changed. You are expected to faithfully execute the laws as written.
I am sure that I am not the only one who has been upset about this, but it is nonetheless good to see someone is attempting to get this very real problem of our federal government back in line.
Through the years, Congress has passed numerous laws. It's hard to keep up with exactly what is and isn't legal nowadays, though most of us manage to figure out the broad strokes.
As bad as that is, federal agencies have been empowered by Congress to essentially create new laws with the stroke of a pen. These regulations have the force of law but are created by faceless bureaucrats rather than our elected representatives. This has created issues regarding guns, the environment, commerce, and pretty much every aspect of American life. Now, an organization is doing something about it.
No, the Firearms Policy Coalition isn't the only one that has tried, but it's the one taking action at the moment:
Firearms Policy Coalition (FPC) announced the filing of a brief with the United States Supreme Court in the case of FCC v. Consumers' Research, which is set to address the question of when and how Congress may delegate its authority to administrative agencies. The brief can be viewed at FPCLaw.org.
“Amici have a particular interest in this case for two reasons. Amici litigate cases in federal court around the country, and the question added by the Court concerning the availability of mootness exceptions is of great importance to Amici,” the brief explains, as “firearms cases frequently risk becoming moot, and the contours of the mootness doctrine are thus extremely important to Amici. Of even greater import to Amici is reigning in unconstitutional delegations of legislative power. Individual liberty, including the right to keep and bear arms, is routinely violated under the guise of broad delegations to administrative agencies.”
Knighton puts a very nice spin on why the Congress first started delegating law making powers to the Executive branch:
Look, I understand why Congress started empowering federal agencies to create regulations. Passing laws is time-consuming, and a lot of times, it's just not going to happen even when it probably needs to. By allowing agencies to enact regulations and interpret law, they can be more agile and, arguably, less beholden to political whims.
I am not so sure. I suspect that legislators are first of all political animals, not really interested in getting into the weeds of most issues. Most of them are lawyers, and don't want to do the work to become experts themselves, so pass the actual lawmaking on to the "experts." But this blurs the lines between the two branches. Rather, with fewer agency bureaucrats in the Executive branch, Congress could afford more specialists to do some of the heavy lifting while writing the bills. But while executive branch "experts" tend to stay on, Congressional staffers can come and go more freely. Moreover, by having Congress make the law, and preventing the Executive from making laws, we restore the balance making Congress more powerful while making the presidency less so.
No comments:
Post a Comment