Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Corp. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc.

Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Corp. v. NRDC
Supreme Court of the United States
Argued November 28, 1977 Decided April 3, 1978
Full case name	Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Corp. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc.
Citations	435 U.S. 519 (more)
Holding
While federal agencies are free to grant additional procedural rights in the exercise of their discretion, reviewing courts are generally not free to impose them if the agencies have not chosen to grant them.
Court membership
Chief Justice Warren E. Burger Associate Justices William J. Brennan, Jr. · Potter Stewart Byron White · Thurgood Marshall Harry Blackmun · Lewis F. Powell, Jr. William Rehnquist · John P. Stevens
Case opinions
Majority	Rehnquist, joined by unanimous court
Blackmun, Powell took no part in the consideration or decision of the case.
Laws applied
Administrative Procedure Act

Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Corp. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, 435 U.S. 519 (1978), is a case in which the United States Supreme Court held that a court cannot impose rulemaking procedures on a federal government agency. The federal Administrative Procedure Act of 1946 and an agency's statutory mandate from Congress establish the maximum requirements for an agency's rulemaking (and adjudicative) process. An agency may grant additional procedural rights in the regulatory process (within constitutional and statutory limits), but a reviewing court cannot "impose upon the agency its own notion of which procedures are 'best' or most likely to further some vague, undefined public good." (435 U.S. at 549.) To do so would exceed the limits of judicial review of agency action.

Subsequent developments

The case was remanded for the circuit court to determine whether the Table S-3 rule was adequately supported by the administrative record. After the NRC revised the rule, the Natural Resources Defense Council filed for judicial review of the new regulation, leading to a second Supreme Court case, Baltimore Gas & Elec. Co. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., 462 U.S. 78 (1983).

See also

• List of United States Supreme Court cases, volume 435
• Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Plant

External links

• Text of Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Corp. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., 435 U.S. 519 (1978) is available from:  Findlaw  Justia  Louisiana State University