Talk:North Carolina State Board of Dental Examiners v. FTC

Discussion about relevance of 1993 Mishler Case.
Is it relevant that sometimes state regulators place the public at greater risk by protecting self-interests as they did in the case against Dr. Mishler? My other thought is that the discussion about the risk of public safety created by dishonest regulators may be a better fit for the licensure category. Mishler v. State Bd. of Med. Examiners, 849 P.2d 291, 109 Nev. 287 (1993). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.35.195.137 (talk • contribs)
 * That is not relevant to this article. There have been many lawsuits against state regulators for many different reasons. Therefore, other issues such as those are not appropriate to add to the article. AHeneen (talk) 16:41, 11 May 2016 (UTC)

Thank you for the comment. I agree that the fact that someone sued a regulator is irrelevant. The importance of the Mishler case is not that he sued the Nevada State Board of Medical Examiners, but that the regulators jeopardized the safety of the public while trying to silence their political enemy. What I am trying to say is that the arguments of regulators - that the state boards deserve antitrust immunity - should be considered in light of their actions. The state medical boards (SMBs) argue that they should be given antitrust immunity because they protect the public. However, the Mishler case calls the public benefit of the nefarious regulators into question.

Health care stakeholders might consider whether those doctors who place the safety of the public at risk deserve to have immunity so that they can pursue self-interests. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.35.195.137 (talk) 22:49, 11 May 2016 (UTC)


 * Again, that case is irrelevant to this article. Although this case involved a medical regulator, the arguments in this case had nothing to do with the fact that they were medical regulators. The premise of this case would apply equally to an apple grower's board that was established by a state, but not actively supervised by the state, and composed of apple farmers engaging in anti-competitive practices. This case had nothing to do with "regulators jeopardiz[ing] the safety of the public while trying to silence their political enemy."
 * Additionally you need to understand the premise for why regulators have immunity in some circumstances. The relationship between the states and the federal government is that all the states are sovereign, but ceded some of their sovereignty by ratifying the U.S. Constitution and joining the U.S. Some sovereign powers were ceded entirely to the federal government, some are shared between the states and the federal government, and some are exclusive to the states. The power to regulate commerce is shared between the states and federal government. This is a concept called "federalism" and it is too complex to explain further here.
 * The Sherman Act forms the basis of the antitrust violations in this case. In Parker v. Brown, the U.S. Supreme Court determined that "there is no suggestion of a purpose to restrain state action in the [Sherman] Act's legislative history." This established the Parker immunity doctrine. In California Retail Liquor Dealers Ass'n v. Midcal Aluminum, Inc., the court further decided that states cannot simply pass a law allowing just any corporation or individual to get around federal law, so they added an "active supervision" criteria to Parker immunity doctrine. However, in a later case, Hallie v. Eau Claire, 471 U.S. 34, the U.S. Supreme Court gave Parker immunity to a state agency (a city government) which was not "actively supervised" by the state government. The NCSBDE cited that case as a defense against an antitrust lawsuit by the FTC. The lower courts rejected that argument because of the nature of the relationship between a city government and a state government. To address this issue of law, the U.S. Supreme Court decided to accept the case. The court distinguished the Hallie v. Eau Claire case and decided that if a controlling number of the people on a licensing board are active participants in the market they regulate, they must be actively supervised by the state. AHeneen (talk) 23:10, 12 May 2016 (UTC)