Civics: “the court made up the ‘major questions doctrine,’”
“I want to flag one case that’s really funny to me, Nuclear Regulatory Commission v. Texas. It’s sort of like the chickens coming home to roost…”
“… for the Supreme Court. A few years ago, the court made up the ‘major questions doctrine,’ the principle that when an agency makes a decision that involves a ‘major question,’ courts have a free-floating veto to block it. Well, the 5th Circuit used this doctrine to blow up the entire system of nuclear waste storage in this country, possibly forever…. The 5th Circuit sided with Texas in this case, declaring that the commission is actually powerless to grant licenses for the temporary storage of nuclear waste offsite from the plant… not because federal law says the commission can’t do that… [but because] temporary storage is a ‘major question’ because it involves nuclear material. And… Congress has to come in and authorize it even more clearly….Because the question ‘has been hotly politically contested for over a half century.'”More.
