Every year, new rules and regulations are made and interpreted by the federal agencies that make up the American regulatory state. These rules and regulations fill some 74,000 pages of the Federal Register and serve as a hidden tax on the American people who pay for regulations in the form of higher taxes and fewer economic opportunities. The continuous creation of rules by federal agencies often disregards the will of Congress and pushes the boundaries of their statutory missions.

Fortunately, that may be about to change. On May 1, the Supreme Court of the United States announced it would hear Loper Bright Enterprises et al. v. Raimondo , which deals with a National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) rule on fishery inspectors. This rule would force fishermen to invite federal inspectors on their ships to observe operations and require them to compensate the inspectors for their time. Unsurprisingly, fishing company Loper Bright Enterprises decided to appeal the case to SCOTUS. The court’s decision to accept this appeal could signal the justices’ willingness to revisit a nearly 40-year-old legal doctrine established in the landmark 1984 court case Chevron U.S.A. v. Natural Resources Defense Council , which the NMFS has used to justify its new rule.

This legal doctrine known as the “ Chevron deference ” holds that courts must defer to the interpretation of federal agencies whenever Congress is ambiguous or silent on the law. The doctrine’s only limitation is that this interpretation must be “reasonable.” Unfortunately, this vagueness has allowed federal agencies to expand their power and influence over time.

The fact that the Supreme Court has decided to grant certiorari in Loper Bright, despite opposition from the Justice Department, could spell trouble for the Chevron deference. This is good news for everyone since, from the beginning, the Chevron doctrine was problematic.

The doctrine gives unelected federal agencies sweeping power to interpret legal statutes in a manner that suits their regulatory agenda. In the process, it sidesteps Congress’ constitutional role of creating and interpreting new laws. While Congress should still have the authority to delegate specific tasks to agencies, at no point should federal agencies have priority in interpreting legal statutes simply because Congress has not weighed in on the subject.

In recent years, several Supreme Court justices have made this exact point. Justice Neil Gorsuch has previously suggested Chevron permits “executive bureaucracies to swallow up large amounts of core judicial and legislative power and concentrate federal power in a way that seems more than a little difficult to square with the Constitution of the framers’ design.” Justice Clarence Thomas has also been critical of the legal doctrine.

More recently, the court has made it clear through clarification of the “ major questions doctrine ” in West Virginia v. EPA that federal agencies must be able to demonstrate “clear congressional authorization” when claiming authority over a given statute. While the court did not specifically mention Chevron in its decision, the justices nonetheless seem to be hinting that they are increasingly weary of federal overreach.

The Chevron doctrine is also inconsistent with the Administrative Procedure Act (ACP) . A recent Bloomberg article notes that the ACP is the “cornerstone of administrative procedure in the U.S.” Yet, this crucial federal act specifically directs courts to “handle all relevant issues of law.” The Chevron doctrine tramples upon this provision by ignoring the role courts should play in interpreting the law.

However well-intentioned the Burger court may have been when it established the Chevron deference, it is now routinely abused by federal agencies.

And while it may be argued that scaling back the Chevron doctrine could put an undue burden on Congress to carefully consider every possible contingency before passing a law, that is precisely the point. Congress should be more specific with the directions it gives agencies. Simply allowing agencies to determine what is “reasonable” is bound to end in disaster.

Whether SCOTUS decides to entirely overturn Chevron or simply clarify the doctrine, it would go a long way toward restoring checks and balances to federal rulemaking.

Nathanael Scherer is a policy analyst with the American Consumer Institute, a nonprofit education and research organization. For more information about the Institute, visit us on www.TheAmericanConsumer.Org or follow us on Twitter @ConsumerPal.