In a recent landmark victory for taxpayers and consumers, the U.S. Supreme Court dealt a critical blow to the administrative state. The June 28 ruling modifies the requirement established in the 1984 Chevron U.S.A., Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc. case to defer to regulators’ interpretations of ambiguous statutes. The new decision waters down agencies’ power by allowing courts to exercise “independent judgment” to parse unclear legislative language. Agencies will finally receive much-needed scrutiny from judges, and the United States Postal Service (USPS) is no different. The decision may even increase private competition with the USPS, which has been raising prices and decreasing service over the past few years. With a little help from the folks in black robes, long-struggling USPS consumers may finally catch a break.

Federal laws are often messy and complicated, and the statutes governing mail delivery are no different. Congress long ago granted the USPS a monopoly on letters and packets, making clear that, “Whoever establishes any private express for the conveyance of letters or packets … shall be fined not more than $500 or imprisoned not more than six months, or both.” Congress also set up a confusing USPS monopoly on mailboxes. Section 1725 of Title 18 makes it a crime to knowingly and willfully deposit “any mailable matter such as statements of accounts, circulars, sale bills, or other like matter, on which no postage has been paid, in any letter box established, approved, or accepted by the Postal Service for the receipt or delivery of mail matter on any mail route.”

What words such as “letter” and “packet” and phrases such as “mailable matter” mean is anybody’s guess and that impreciseness is critical to the ramifications of the Supreme Court’s decision.

Under 39 C.F.R. 310.1, the agency defined a letter as a “message directed to a specific person or address and recorded in or on a tangible object.” These objects include, “paper (including paper in sheet or card form), recording disks, and magnetic tapes,” subject to some exceptions surrounding the intrinsic worth of the material that the message is on. This seems to implicate a wide swath of lightweight electronic products that fall outside the common-sense definition of letters, such as hard drives, computer chips, and even some phones.

The issue of “mailable matter” is similarly confusing because there are plenty of objects that could conceivably be placed inside of a mailbox that would not be accepted by the USPS for delivery. For example, USPS regulations generally prohibit the shipment and delivery of cigarettes and smokeless tobacco. Similar regulations were recently promulgated for electronic cigarettes. If a business or organization wants to deliver these products and leaves them in their business mailbox for a private courier to pick up, they would likely be in violation of USPS regulations despite the lack of statutory prohibition in 18 USC 1725.

Other USPS regulations pertaining to the mailbox monopoly also stretch beyond legislative language. Based on a plain reading of 18 USC 1725, mailable matter on the inside of a USPS-approved mailbox must have paid postage attached to it. Yet in their regulations, the agency embraces a far more expansive definition of their mailbox monopoly. The USPS’ Domestic Mail Manual makes clear that, “no part of a mail receptacle may be used to deliver any matter not bearing postage, including items or matter placed upon, supported by, attached to, hung from, or inserted into a mail receptacle.” Amazon or UPS could easily run afoul of federal regulations simply by placing their packages squarely on top of mailboxes.

Allowing courts to scrutinize these expansive agency interpretations could go a long way toward empowering competition. For example, modern courts would likely examine the plain meaning of the word “letter” as understood at the time of either the 1872 recodification or the 1845 rewriting of postal laws instead of blindly deferring to the agency. Webster’s 19th century An American Dictionary of the English Language would not bode well for agency attempts to include electronics in the definition of the word “letter.” Additionally, courts would likely interpret “mailable matter” in a common-sense way that would allow private shippers to make at least some use of the space in and around mailboxes.

This would be a welcome change for an agency that likes to threaten thousands of dollars in fines for the high crime of dropping off unenveloped fliers in people’s mailboxes. It would also save private shippers the time and expense associated with going to consumers’ doors to drop off parcels. The new SCOTUS decision is good news for the millions of taxpayers and consumers fed up with America’s mail carrier.

Ross Marchand is a non-resident fellow for the Taxpayers Protection Alliance.