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Importance Of Ambiguity

Decent Essays

Given the statute is ambiguous, the court should have deferred to the IRS and left the decision in the agency’s hands on an ongoing basis because this agency deference approach: (1) provides the best resolution between textualist and purposivist ways of interpretation; (2) is the optimal choice from a cost-benefit standpoint because it is less costly to let agencies interpret statutes than both Courts and Congress; (3) best reflects the overarching principle of separation of powers; (4) ; (5) will not lead to the abuse of discretion due to the existence of ongoing checks including “hard look” review and reliance interest restriction. According to the Chevron two-step framework, the Court should first determine whether the statute is ambiguous on the question at issue; if so, the Court should simply move forward to Step Two. However, it is never easy to decide the existence of ambiguity. In regard to textual reading, judges are likely to disagree about whether the statutory text at hand is clear and specific – seemingly clear statutory languages can be ambiguous others’ eyes. (Brown Williamson and those cases), and this would make it difficult to decide whether there is a gap or ambiguity sufficient to trigger Chevron deference. …show more content…

Agencies have the luxury of being able to dig deeply into the available materials; while judges cannot possibly read all the committee reports and floor debates associated with each statute they encounter, agency interpreters confront a smaller set of statutes and therefore can become familiar with the relevant records. More importantly, agencies are likely to be in a better position to know whether departure from the text will diminish predictability or even unsettle the statutory scheme. Just as in King, the IRS has worked closely with Congress in enacting ACA, therefore has a much better understanding on the significance on the issue of the distribution of

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