Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/23pdf/22-1008_1b82.pdf
Page Number: 38

10 

CORNER POST, INC. v. BOARD OF GOVERNORS, FRS 

KAVANAUGH, J., concurring 

Suits  where  one  business  challenges  the  under-
regulation of another go well beyond competitor suits.  One 
example is the Court’s landmark decision in Motor Vehicle 
Manufacturers  Association  of  United  States,  Inc.  v.  State 
Farm  Mutual  Automobile  Insurance  Co.,  463  U. S.  29 
(1983).  That case arose when several insurance companies
challenged a federal agency’s rescission of safety standards 
for new motor vehicles.  The Court held that the agency’s 
decision to rescind those safety standards was subject to the 
same degree of judicial review as the decision to issue the
standards in the first place.  See id., at 40–44.  The Court 
also  concluded  that  the  rescission  of  the  safety  standards
was arbitrary and capricious.  See id., at 44–57. 

At  no  point  in  that  landmark  opinion  on  the  judicial
review  of  agency  actions  did  the  Court  state  (or  need  to 
state) the obvious:  Because the agency did not regulate the 
insurers themselves, the insurers could obtain relief from 
the  downstream  effects  of  the  agency’s  rescission  of  the 
safety standards only if the insurers could obtain vacatur of 
that rescission.  The Court did not dwell on that remedial 
point  because  the  availability  of  vacatur  was  presumably
obvious to all involved.  Only now—some 40 years later—
does the Government imply that the premise of State Farm 
was mistaken. 

The  Government’s  new  position  would  also  largely
eliminate  the  common  form  of  environmental  litigation
where  private  citizens  sue  a  federal  agency  based  on  the 
externalities  that  an  agency  action  is  likely  to  produce. 
Litigation  often  arises  when  a  federal  agency  approves  a 
development  project  with  potential  effects  on 
the 
environment  or  on  other  property  owners.  Examples
include  the  construction  of  a  new  pipeline,  see  Delaware 
Riverkeeper  Network  v.  FERC,  753  F. 3d  1304  (CADC
2014),  or  the  mining  of  federal  land,  see  WildEarth 
Guardians v. Jewell, 738 F. 3d 298 (CADC 2013).  In those 
cases,  the  plaintiff  generally  cannot  bring  an  APA  suit