Year: 1941
Type: article
Abstract: REEDOM to exercise discretion in individual cases, it is submitted, is the essence of the administrative process.But it is the exercise of such discretion "especially where it is not in the hands of experts, operating under quasi-judicial procedures, into which arbitrariness may creep, and which may furnish a cover for favoritism or even personal spite.In this view the rule-making power may be regarded as the reintroduction of the rule of law at the administrative level.If administrative authorities concretize by more specific regulations the legislative abstractions they are to apply, they canalize their own discretion in individual cases, and minimize the chances of arbitrary discrimination that inheres in such discretion.At the same time they furnish that ability to discount the future that is the principal advantage of the rule of law." 1 But the rule-making power itself may be exercised arbitrarily.A principal safeguard against this possibility, however, lies in the requirement of appropriate rule-making procedures. 2 How are-such procedures to be formulated?Some clues for the solution of this problem may be expected in a study of the procedures of well established administrative agencies.With this conviction the present paper, purporting to be a "physiological analysis" of the rule-making procedure of the Wisconsin Public Service Commission, has been undertaken.3 In the exercise of its supervisory and regulatory powers the Commission is authorized in specified cases to issue quasi-legislative rules
Source: Marquette law review
Author: Wallace B. Mendelson
Institution: Marquette University
Language: English
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W1570697245