The agency system you are advocating for has only a few decades of history. Chevron was a 1984 decision, and didn’t really rise to prominence until the Obama administration.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chevron_U.S.A.,_Inc._v._Natura....
That’s what Chevron deference is about. There is no law on the books that gives the FTC authorization to ban non-competes. They just argued that it kinda-sorta fell within the scope of their expertise and did it.
That is by and large how the government has been run for the last decade and a half. It is not how the government has run for most of the last 100 years as you claim. Most of that time period the agencies stuck to the letter of the law, only deviating in rare circumstances.
Sure there is; it's the Federal Trade Commission Act, which says "Unfair methods of competition in or affecting commerce, and unfair or deceptive acts or practices in or affecting commerce, are hereby declared unlawful."
They, through the regulatory process, correctly determined that non-competes are unfair methods of competition.
> But prior to Obama’s administration, it was really rare the agencies would enforce policies with no basis in the law whatsoever.
Obama's administration changed the makeup of the court with his loss of Scalia's seat, failure to pressure RBG to resign, and Trump's subsequent picks; that's what changed. The regulatory setup long predates his presidency. Chevron fell because the court got extra conservative members, nothing more.
Not really. Do you think "Unfair" has an objective definition? Just saying something is unfair won't make it automatically or objectively unfair. Non competes are not deceptive.
It may be covered but the point it is not logically implied by the text you quoted.
Compare that with the objectivity of this (still contains a lot subjectivity):
https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/USCODE-2013-title42/html...
The first: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interstate_Commerce_Commission
Chevron was a failed attempt at knocking that setup down.
Nothing in this decision "guts" the agencies.
The ruling is literally the opposite.
The power is put in the hands of the courts and it is take away from the executive appointed agencies.
Congress has ultimate authority, period. So the SCOTUS running amok is a very bad look and smell.
This new system is even worse. At some point, the Judiciary will make a poor ruling. Perhaps this ruling is impossible to hold to, but maybe the executive branch decides to usurp the court of its own volition. Then what?
The checks and balances system of our government only works when everyone plays nice. But if push comes to shove, then the executive branch is the one that holds all the power. They don't have to obey the legislator nor the judiciary -- neither has any real capability to enforce their will.
The country has been slow rolling into single pillar government structure for decades now. IMHO, this ruling is a huge step towards solidifying the executive branch as the de facto sole branch of government. Government agencies were provided a mechanism for all three branches of government to work together, legislators provided scope and leadership, the judiciary provided checks, and the executive provided the operations.
Once the agencies are all gutted, a future administration is going get an opportunity to act on their own via executive authority and they will ignore any attempts by the court to stop them, because the court is literally powerless in all but word. And that's what opens the door to a president who begins seizing assets of political opponents.
Lots of authoritarian countries masquerade as democracies because legislators and judiciaries are inherently powerless to stop executives.
I know plenty of people will counter with the old way was supporting an authoritarian executive. But to them, I'll point out that the agency system has ~100 years of efficacy behind it.