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WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court has declined to review a split decision from the Sixth Circuit that upheld the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration's (OSHA) authority to set workplace safety standards as constitutional. The lower federal appellate court had declined to rehear the case in December.

The justices on Monday denied a petition for a writ of certiorari filed in January by Allstates Refractory Contractors LLC. The company had argued in its petition that by empowering OSHA to regulate workplace safety standards to the extent that it does, Congress unconstitutionally delegated too much of its own power, as U.S. Circuit Judge John B. Nalbandian had said in his dissenting opinion from August.

"This delegation is as unconstitutional as it is unparalleled among modern agencies," Allstates Refractory said in its petition. "And it was adopted precisely so Congress could avoid making the 'hard choices' innate to balancing worker safety with industry costs — the sort of legislative choices the Constitution requires Congress to make."

The U.S. Department of Labor told the justices the opposite in its brief opposing the certiorari petition filed on May 1. According to the Labor Department, many of Allstates Refractory's contentions about the purportedly unchecked authority OSHA has are "refuted by" the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970, the federal legislation that created the agency.

Secretary of Labor Julie A. Su argued in the department's brief that while Congress cannot delegate its legislative authority to the executive branch of the government, courts have long agreed that it can ask the executive branch for assistance via agencies like OSHA. The majority of the three-judge panel from the Sixth Circuit agreed with Su's position when they ruled on the case in August.

Allstates Refractory, a general contractor providing furnace services to facilities producing glass, metals, and petrochemicals, first sued the Labor Department in 2021 to challenge whether the agency could constitutionally set workplace safety standards. The district court granted summary judgment to the government, and the majority of the Sixth Circuit panel affirmed that summary judgment grant.

Koch brothers think tank Americans for Prosperity and other organizations pushed for a full court rehearing on the panel's decision but were ultimately unsuccessful. Many of those same organizations, including Americans for Prosperity itself, also filed amicus briefs with the high court supporting Allstates Refractory's requested writ of certiorari.

The Department of Labor is represented by Elizabeth B. Prelogar, Brian M. Boynton, Alisa B. Klein, and Courtney L. Dixon of the U.S. Department of Justice.

Allstates Refractory is represented by Donald F. McGahn II, Brett A. Schumate, John M. Gore, Anthony J. Dick, Brinton Lucas, and Harry S. Graver of Jones Day.

The case is Allstates Refractory Contractors LLC, Petitioner v. Julie A. Su, Acting Secretary of Labor et al., case number 23-819, in the Supreme Court of the United States.