The decline of the American nuclear energy architecture was not merely political. It was institutional and legal, though not directed at nuclear energy itself. Reformers in the 1970s, reacting to perceived bureaucratic excess and regulatory capture, embedded procedural constraints across the admin­istrative state. Environmental statutes introduced layers of adversarial oversight that prioritized transparency and legal challenge over coher­ence and execution. The regulatory center of gravity shifted toward the courts. Standing rules were relaxed, citizen suits multiplied, and statutes like NEPA became primary instruments for challenging, delaying, or procedurally exhausting federal projects. These changes, while not aimed at nuclear energy development directly, rendered the deployment of sovereign-scale infrastructure increasingly untenable…

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