Lawmakers are digging into the impacts of California’s Prop 12.
The House Agriculture Committee is hearing from producers, economists, and legal experts. One Farm Bureau attorney says that the Supreme Court’s decision created a legal mess.
He says that action is needed because the ruling left farmers without clear rules and without a path forward.
According to Travis Cushman, “Farm Bureau’s efforts resulted in a Supreme Court decision that is so convoluted, so confusing, and so contradictory that no one can articulate the state of the dormant commerce clause today or how courts should proceed with similar claims. As you know, you need five of the nine Justices to agree with you to win a case. Six justices agreed with our legal theory and five agreed that we’d established enough facts to win on that claim. An easy win, right? Not quite! Because the way we count votes at the Supreme Court, our farmers lost. The resulting fractured five/four decision lacks a unifying rationale.”
Cushman says that the decision shows why Congress needs to step in.
Without federal rules, more states could pass their own animal care laws that could leave farmers stuck with costly barn changes and no clear standard.
