By a 2-1 margin with Judge David Sentelle dissenting, a panel of the D.C. Circuit upheld the USDA’s rule prohibiting companies from testing beef they own for the dread disease. The rule had been challenged by Creekstone Farms, a Kansas-based meat exporter. (Legal Times “BLT”; opinion in PDF; earlier).
2 Comments
When Congress writes vague laws and depends upon Executive Branch bureaucrats to make rules & regulations to implement those laws we end up with court decisions like this one.
The court decision wasn’t that bad a decision legally. It’s the policy decision that’s the problem.
Time to contact your representatives so Congress actually sits up & takes enough notice to amend the law.
It isn’t going to be easy to get Congress to amend the law. The decision benefits the majority of ranchers, who do want to minimize the amount of BSE testing that they do. As I understand it, they exerted pressure on USDA to prevent Creekstone from doing the extra testing. They can be expected to lobby Congress to the same effect.