Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/23pdf/22-1008_1b82.pdf
Page Number: 33

Cite as:  603 U. S. ____ (2024) 

5 

KAVANAUGH, J., concurring 

APA,  the  longstanding  and  settled  precedent  adhering  to
that  text  and  history,  and  the  radical  consequences  for 
administrative law and individual liberty that would ensue 
if vacatur were suddenly no longer available.

The text and history of the APA authorize vacatur.  The 
text directs courts to “set aside” unlawful agency actions.  5 
U. S. C.  §706(2)(A).    When  Congress  enacted  the  APA  in
1946,  the  phrase  “set  aside”  meant  “cancel,  annul,  or 
revoke.”  Black’s Law Dictionary 1612 (3d ed. 1933); see also
Black’s  Law  Dictionary  1537  (4th  ed.  1951)  (same);
Bouvier’s Law Dictionary 1103 (W. Baldwin ed. 1926) (“To
annul; to make void; as, to set aside an award”).   At  that 
time,  it  was  common  for  an  appellate  court  that  reversed 
the decision of a lower court to direct that the lower court’s 
“judgment” be “set aside,” meaning vacated.  E.g., Shawkee 
Mfg. Co. v. Hartford-Empire Co., 322 U. S. 271, 274 (1944).  
Likewise,  Congress  used  the  phrase  “set  aside”  in  many 
pre-APA statutes that plainly contemplated the vacatur of 
agency actions.2 

The 

APA 

incorporated 

and 
contemporaneous meaning of “set aside.”  When a federal 
court sets aside an agency action, the federal court vacates
that order—in much the same way that an appellate court 
vacates the judgment of a trial court. 

common 

that 

The APA prescribes the same “set aside” remedy for all 
categories of “agency action,” including agency adjudicative
orders and agency rules.  §§551(13), 706(2).  When a federal 
court  concludes  that  an  agency  adjudicative  order  is 

—————— 

2 See, e.g., Hepburn Act of 1906, ch. 3591, §5, 34 Stat. 584, 592 (courts
could “enjoin, set aside, annul, or suspend any order or requirement of ” 
the Interstate Commerce Commission); Securities Exchange Act of 1934,
ch. 404, §25(a), 48 Stat. 881, 902 (authorizing courts “to affirm, modify,
and enforce or set aside [an] order” of the SEC); Federal Food, Drug, and 
Cosmetic  Act  of  1938,  ch.  675,  §701(f )(3),  52  Stat.  1040,  1055–1056 
(authorizing a court to “affirm the order” of the FDA, “or to set it aside 
in whole or in part, temporarily or permanently”).