The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday rejected a challenge that could have eviscerated the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), despite dissent from two conservative justices.
Ohio construction contractors, backed by Republican-led states and anti-regulation advocates, have called on Congress to Delegating legislative power in violation of the ConstitutionIt is the government’s fault for giving such broad powers to the agencies that set and enforce workplace standards.
After the lower courts rejected the challenge, the court issued a brief order denying the contractor’s appeal. Conservative Justices Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch have publicly indicated they will hear the case, but a majority of four votes would be needed to rule in favor.
Gorsuch did not explain. Thomas isargued that OSHA’s challenge presented an “excellent avenue” for addressing significant constitutional issues.
“The question of whether the Occupational Safety and Health Administration’s broad authority is consistent with our nation’s constitutional structure is undoubtedly an important one,” Thomas wrote.
He noted that other conservative members of the Supreme Court, including Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Samuel Alito and Brett Kavanaugh, have long expressed interest in “rethinking how the Supreme Court approaches” Congress’ delegations of power to federal agencies.
Thomas argued that the Department of Labor’s authority extends to “almost every company in America,” citing Kavanaugh’s dissent from years ago, saying the department has asserted authority over everything from the design of electric lawnmowers to the extent to which SeaWorld trainers can interact with whales.
“The OSH Act may be the broadest delegation of authority to an executive branch ever found in the United States Code,” Thomas wrote. “If this broad grant of authority does not unduly vest lawmaking power in an executive branch, it is difficult to imagine what it would unduly vest.”
He further argued that it would be “equally reprehensible” for Congress to authorize the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to tax anyone it deems “appropriate.”
The challenge to OSHA was filed by Allstates Refractory LLC, a small Ohio general contractor that provides furnace services to the glass, metals and petrochemical industries. The suit was supported by 23 Republican state attorneys general and a variety of liberal legal groups.
Following the Supreme Court’s recent overwhelming victories for conservatives and anti-regulation advocates, they sought to use the case to further their efforts to reduce the size of the “administrative state.”
The contractors were represented in the Supreme Court by Don McGahn, who served as White House counsel under former President Trump.
The Supreme Court’s decision to reject the appeal on Tuesday came days after it invalidated the Securities and Exchange Commission’s internal enforcement system used to seek civil fraud penalties. The case raised similar issues to the OSHA complaint, but the Supreme Court resolved the case on different grounds.
And last week, the Supreme Court took a hard line on executive branch power by overturning Chevron deference, a now-defunct doctrine that instructed judges to defer to executive branch decisions when the law is ambiguous.
However, earlier in that period, the courts preserved the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) by upholding its funding mechanisms.
