Opinion ID: 3395195
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Commission’s plan

Text: The district court concluded that the Commission’s plan authorizes the Secretary of Commerce to regulate striped bass in federal waters, the EEZ. It further noted that the Secretary of Commerce promulgated a regulation—50 C.F.R. § 697.7(b)— “prohibiting fishing for Atlantic striped bass in the EEZ,” 12 which is “the same regulation under which [defendants are] being prosecuted.” Thus, the district court held the Commission’s plan regulates the captains’ conduct (by way of the Secretary of Commerce’s rule that the plan “authorized”), and the Lacey Act exemption applies. We disagree. 1. The plan does not authorize the Secretary of Commerce’s regulation As an interpretive manner, the Commission’s plan does not authorize the Secretary of Commerce to issue the regulation banning fishing for bass in federal waters. The text of the Commission’s plan does not purport to grant any power to regulate federal waters to the Secretary of Commerce. In fact, a portion of a 2003 amendment to the Commission’s plan reads: Management of striped bass in the EEZ is within the Jurisdiction of the Secretary of Commerce. The responsibilities of the Secretary of Commerce are detailed in the Atlantic Striped Bass Conservation Act. Amendment 6, at p.38 § 4.8.8.1. This provision is a simple acknowledgement by the Commission of the Secretary of Commerce’s independent authority under the Bass Act. See 16 U.S.C. § 5158(a); 55 Fed. Reg. 40,181, 1990 WL 351745 (Oct. 2, 1990); 50 C.F.R. § 697.1. Moreover, Section 2.4 of Amendment 6 defines the plan’s “management unit” to expressly “exclud[e] the Exclusive Economic Zone (3-200 nautical miles offshore).” Id. 13 at v & 20; see id. at vii & 39 § 4.9 (recognizing that “management of striped bass in the exclusive economic zone (EEZ) is the responsibility of the Secretary [of Commerce],” while also making non-binding recommendations to the Secretary of Commerce regarding federal waters as contemplated by 16 U.S.C. §§ 5158(a)(3), (b)). In other words, the Commission’s plan disclaimed any regulatory role over federal waters and instead recognized the regulation of federal waters as part of the powers granted to the Secretary of Commerce by the Bass Act. In sum, nothing in the Commission’s plan purports to grant authority over federal waters to the Secretary of Commerce. 2. The plan cannot authorize the Secretary of Commerce’s regulation Even had the Commission tried to endow the Secretary of Commerce with some form of power over federal waters, the attempt would have been legally meaningless. The Secretary of Commerce is the head of an executive department of the United States and a member of the President’s cabinet. See 5 U.S.C. § 101; U.S. Const. Art. II, § 2, cl.2. In other words, she derives her authority from federal sources—acts of Congress and the inherent Article II powers of the Executive Branch. As it pertains to this case, her power to regulate federal waters comes directly from the Bass Act. 16 U.S.C. § 5158(a). 14 The Commission, by contrast, is the creature of an interstate compact that binds only the sovereign States that are parties to it. See Pub. L. No. 77-539, 56 Stat. 267 (May 4, 1942); New York, 609 F.3d at 526. It is, for instance, “not a federal agency within the meaning of the” Administrative Procedure Act, i.e., not an “authority of the Government of the United States.” New York, 609 F.3d at 527. “The fact that the [Commission] was created by an interstate compact and approved by Congress does not alter th[e] analysis.” Id. at 532; see id. at 533 (“we cannot escape the fact that the entity itself is an aggregation of states”). Simply put, the Commission, as a compilation of State representatives, is charged with regulating the States’ own waters. See id. at 527; Medeiros v. Vincent, 431 F.3d 25, 27 (1st Cir. 2005). The Secretary of Commerce regulates federal waters because that is what Congress told her to do in the Bass Act. The Secretary of Commerce needs nothing further, and the Commission has nothing to bestow on her.