The court holds unlawful a U.S. Department of Commerce fishing quota that allocates the summer catch of scup on a state-by-state basis for Massachusetts, New York, and Rhode Island. Massachusetts argued that the quota was based on incomplete historical data that reflected only scup landings from lar...

The court holds that a district court abused its discretion by abstaining from hearing property owner's Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) claims against two petroleum companies. The court first holds that Florida's underground storage tank (UST) program is preempted to the extent there i...

The court affirms a district court's grant of summary judgment in favor of the U.S. Department of Commerce (DOC), finding that its denial of Connecticut's petition for rulemaking under the Magnuson-Stevens Act was not arbitrary or capricious and was consistent with all relevant law. Connecticut soug...

The court holds that Eleventh Amendment sovereign immunity bars an environmental group's suit against a state environmental agency challenging the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's grant of a migratory bird depredation permit to the state agency. The court first holds that the state environmental age...

The court holds that Massachusetts' environmental superlien statute, which allows the commonwealth to place a priority lien on property after spending money assessing or cleaning up a polluted tract of land, evades the Bankruptcy Code's automatic stay provision. The case arose after Massachusetts so...

The court denies an environmental group's petition to review the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA's) approval of Maryland's revised motor vehicle emissions budget (MVEB) for the Baltimore ozone nonattainment area. In 1999, EPA determined that the MVEB in the state's attainment demonstrati...

The court upholds the conviction of a fertilizer company owner who allowed hazardous waste to be disposed of without a permit while knowing that his actions placed others in imminent danger of death or serious bodily injury, but the court vacates a district court order requiring the owner to pay a $...

The court affirms a February 2001, district court order requiring the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to make an air quality attainment status determination for the St. Louis, Missouri, area and to publish it in the Federal Register by March 20, 2001, and affirms a subsequent court order ...

The court holds that the Eleventh Amendment bars all but two claims brought by citizen groups in federal court against a state official accused of failing to implement, administer, enforce, and maintain a federally approved state coal mining program under the Surface Mining Control and Reclamation A...

The court holds that the Secretary of the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation and the Secretary of the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection violated the Clean Air Act (CAA) by failing to implement state implementation plan (SIP)-required emission standards for the state's enhanc...