Section 33 Retroactive Effect of Rules

• Library: Administrative Law 2011

The customary view is that rules may be retroactive if they are reasonable. Gen. Tel. Co. of Sw. v. United States, 449 F.2d 846, 863
(5^th Cir. 1971). They may also be retroactive if they are considered procedural in nature.

In St. Louis Police Officers’ Ass’n v. Sayad, 685 S.W.2d 913 (Mo. App. E.D. 1984), the court stated the belief that the same principles governing retroactivity that applied to statutes should apply to administrative rules. Thus, it found that a rule that it considered to be “procedural” could be applied retroactively. The same result was reached in State v. Kummer, 741 S.W.2d 285 (Mo. App. E.D. 1987), involving a rule that approved a method of breath analysis...