The Soap and Detergent Association, a trade association for detergent manufacturers, recently filed a suit against the city of Akron, Ohio, Soap and Detergent Association v. Akron, 1 ELR Dig.
Two brief companion decisions of a unanimous Supreme Court, decided March 24, 1971, are of great importance to the determination of federal water rights in western states. Although deceptively simple on the surface, the opinions reaffirm the right of the United States to reserve water for federal lands independent of state water law.
While environmental groups challenging federal administrative actions have overcome judicial obstacles to standing in most of the federal circuit courts of appeal, the Ninth Circuit stands fast. Not only to contradictions and ambiguities exist between the Ninth Circuit and other circuit courts, but they exist among district courts within the Ninth Circuit itself as well. There the situation is likely to remain in limbo until the Supreme Court, which has granted certiorari in Sierra Club v. Hickel, supra, chooses to resolve the standing issue with finality. See Sierra Club v.
In its decision in Citizens to Preserve Overton Park v. Volpe, __ U.S. __, 1 ELR 20110 (Mar. 2, 1971), the Supreme Court attempted to analyze and clarify the role of a reviewing court before which discretionary administrative action has been challenged.
On April 14, 1971, the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia denied plaintiffs' motion for a preliminary injunction in Environmental Defense Fund v. Hardin (Mirex), 1 ELR 20207. See also 1 ELR Dig. [44]. Plaintiffs sought to bar the Secretary of Agriculture from undertaking a program to control the imported fire ant in several southeastern states by aerial application of the pesticide Mirex. Defendant's motion to dismiss was earlier denied December 1, 1970.
On October 1, 1970, the Thomas J. Anderson, Gordon Rockwell Environmental Protection Act of 1970 took effect in the state of Michigan. See text of the act at 1 ELR 43001. Since that time, 13 lawsuits have been brought under the act, six of which were brought by units of state and county government. The first action filed under the act, a taxpayer's class action, has reached decision in a county court, which found portions of the act unconstitutional. See Roberts v. Michigan, 1 ELR 20227 (Mich. Cir. Ct. Ingham Co., May 4, 1971).
Among strategies for the improved abatement of pollution, Congress has overwhelmingly preferred the traditional regulatory approach, as exemplified in the standard-setting mechanisms of existing legislation for federal water and air pollution control. However, in recent years, proposals for federal legislation that creates economic incentives of various kinds have attracted congressional attention.
Far-reaching questions concerning the Federal Communications Commission's Fairness Doctrine and its applicability to environmental issues have arisen in recent months, at least some of which are likely to be adjudicated by the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia in Friends of the Earth v. Federal Communications Commission, No. 24,556, 1 ELR Dig. [168], (D.C. Cir., filed Aug. 17, 1970), where petitioners have asked the court to apply the doctrine to certain commercials for large automobiles and leaded gasolines that were shown over WNBC-TV, New York.
A new direction in litigation concerning environmental impact statements required under §102(2)(C) of the National environmental Policy Act was recently initiated by a group of scientists seeking to compel the Atomic Energy Commission to file such a statement assessing alternatives for an entire long-range legislative program, instead of just for routine action taken under the agency's existing statutory authority. Scientists' Institute for Public Information v. AEC, 1 ELR Dig. 182 (D.D.C., filed May 25, 1971).
The Environmental Law Reporter will continue to fill all orders from ELR subscribers and users for facsimile copies of environmental impact statements, but beginning with the July issue, ELR will no longer maintain a separate Digest Facsimile listing for each environmental impact statement prepared by federal agencies under the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969.