The next Congress has all but taken shape under Republican control, but a more fundamental, behind-the-scenes change is also coming — one that will require more effort and collaboration from a dysfunctional legislature that’s at least as divided as the rest of the country. How is our current Congress supposed to do that?

It may sound impossible, but it’s not. If congressional leadership earnestly commits to diminishing partisan acrimony and gridlock, they’ll find the tools to do it.

In June, the Supreme Court reversed itself in a consequential decision for all three branches of government, overturning its 1984 Chevron U.S.A. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc. ruling.

For decades, this gave Congress an “out” from making hard decisions, and our elected representatives outsourced tricky policy details to an unelected federal bureaucracy. Now, the court has effectively told Congress that it can no longer let the executive branch do its work for them.

The original Chevron decision concerned whether the Environmental Protection Agency overstepped its bounds when regulating air pollution sources. Executive branch agencies are supposed to figure out some details as they enforce Congress’s laws, but sometimes those laws are so vague that it’s not clear where the........

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