Synovus Financial Corporation v. Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, Southtrust Corporation, Intervenor

This is a remarkable case that has at its genesis a jurisdictional dispute between the Federal Reserve Board and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC). After several rounds of briefing in which we put various questions to the “government,” we have before us a range of possible judicial responses. The majority unfortunately has chosen the worst possible course of decision, an erroneous one that does considerable damage to fundamental principles of administrative law. The majority’s opinion — declaring unlawful the Board’s attempt to apply the Douglas Amendment to the Bank Holding…