Humphrey’s Is Dying, if Not Dead, After Supreme Court Order

A 90-year precedent setting up independent agencies isn’t dead yet, but the effect of a US Supreme Court order may largely be the same, some legal experts say.

In an emergency order on Thursday, the court allowed President Donald Trump to fire members of independent agencies, including the National Labor Relations Board and the Merit Systems Protection Board.

The effect, according to the dissenting justices, is to overturn the court’s 1935 ruling in Humphrey’s Executor v. United States, which said that Congress, in some instances, can set up agencies that are independent from the executive branch and whose members ...