Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/23pdf/22-451_7m58.pdf
Page Number: 95.0

14 

LOPER BRIGHT ENTERPRISES v. RAIMONDO 

KAGAN, J., dissenting 

long  engagement  with  a  regulatory  scheme,  and  policy
choice.  It is courts (not agencies) that “have no special com-
petence”—or even legitimacy—when those are the things a
decision calls for. 

Second, the majority complains that an ambiguity or gap 
does not “necessarily reflect a congressional intent that an 
agency” should have primary interpretive authority.  Ante, 
at 22.  On that score, I’ll agree with the premise: It doesn’t 
“necessarily” do so.  Chevron is built on a presumption.  The 
decision  does  not  maintain  that  Congress  in  every  case
wants the agency, rather than a court, to fill in gaps.  The 
decision maintains that when Congress does not expressly 
pick one or the other, we need a default rule; and the best 
default  rule—agency  or  court?—is  the  one  we  think  Con-
gress would generally want.  As to why Congress would gen-
erally want the agency: The answer lies in everything said
above  about  Congress’s  delegation  of  regulatory  power  to 
the agency and the agency’s special competencies.  See su-
pra, at 9–11.  The majority appears to think it is a show-
stopping  rejoinder  to  note  that  many  statutory  gaps  and 
ambiguities are “unintentional.”  Ante, at 22.  But to begin,
many are not; the ratio between the two is uncertain.  See 
supra, at 4–5.  And to end, why should that matter in any 
event?  Congress  may  not  have  deliberately  introduced  a
gap or ambiguity into the statute; but it knows that pretty 
much everything it drafts will someday be found to contain 
such a “flaw.”  Given that knowledge, Chevron asks, what 
would Congress want?  The presumed answer is again the
same (for the same reasons): The agency.  And as with any 
default rule, if Congress decides otherwise, all it need do is 
say.

In that respect, the proof really is in the pudding: Con-
gress basically never says otherwise, suggesting that Chev-
ron chose the presumption aligning with legislative intent 
(or, in the majority’s words, “approximat[ing] reality,” ante, 
at 22).  Over the last four decades, Congress has authorized