Year
1980
Abstract
Recently it has been fashionable to attack regulation and regulatory agencies. Congress withheld appropriations from the Federal Trade Commission and directed that certain regulatory activities in which they were engaged were to be terminated. An industry being harassed by the Occupational Health and Safety Agency v/ent to court and secured a decision that a search warrant was required in order to inspect its premises when it did not voluntarily agree to be inspected. This case went all the way to the Supreme Court of the United States before the earlier decision was reversed. Otherwise rational individuals and organizations sometimes are motivated to irrational acts of retribution by the excessive zeal of regulators whose interests cover only one narrow aspect of an operation. This is not a new problem although the recent proliferation of regulatory organizations at all levels of government (National, State, City, County, District, etc.) has compounded the situation. General Medaris succinctly described the problem when he resigned in frustration as the Director of the Army Missile Command in the mid-60's, as \"layers and layers of authority without responsibility.\"