The court dismisses a property owner's complaint alleging that a New York City watershed memorandum of agreement (MOA) and its regulations violated the U.S. Constitution, the state constitution, and state statutory and common law. The court first holds that the owner's claims that the MOA and its re...
The court reverses a district court dismissal of a property owner's takings claim against a county as unripe. The owner alleged that the county impermissibly listed her driveway as a county road and would not delist it because a neighbor used it to access a road and get mail. The district court held...
The court upholds in part and reverses in part a district court dismissal on forum non conveniens grounds of individuals' Alien Tort Claims Act (ATCA) suit alleging that a foreign oil company participated in human rights violations in Nigeria. The court first holds that the district court properly h...
The court affirms the dismissal of a hog farmer's complaint that alleged a taking of property by an Iowa city in violation of the Public Use Clauses of the U.S. and Iowa Constitutions. The farmer intended to use land bordering an airport for a hog manure lagoon. The city opposed the lagoon and recei...
The court holds that the exhaustion requirements of 43 C.F.R. §4.21(c) do not bar a district court from considering a colorable due process challenge to the procedures followed by the administrative law judge (ALJ) and the Interior Board of Indian Appeals (IBIA) in a pending Indian probate proceedi...
For the last several years, federal circuit courts have debated the exact jurisdictional scope of §404 of the Clean Water Act (CWA), which authorizes the Secretary of the U.S. Army (the Army), acting through the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (the Corps), to issue permits "for the discharge of dredged or fill material into the navigable waters at specified disposal sites." The circuit courts have based their debates on the assumption, well-supported by earlier CWA decisions, that Congress intended the term "navigable waters" within the CWA to extend to the limits of the U.S. Commerce Clause.
Environmentalists are no strangers to disappointment in the U.S. Supreme Court, but the recent case of Solid Waste Agency of Northern Cook County v. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (SWANCC) is particularly disappointing. First, it might be said that the impact of the opinion, in circumstances in which legislative amendment is virtually impossible, may be the most devastating judicial opinion affecting the environment ever.
Does the use by migratory birds of isolated, intrastate waters establish enough of a connection to "navigable waters" and interstate commerce to permit federal regulation under the Clean Water Act (CWA) and the U.S. Commerce Clause? The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers thinks so, but courts and commentators have not been entirely sympathetic to the Corps' so-called migratory bird rule. The Fourth Circuit and U.S. Supreme Court Justice Thomas (in a dissent from denial of certiorari) have rejected such a broad jurisdictional reach in no uncertain terms.
The court refuses to enjoin continued construction of the Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway and rules that plaintiffs are barred by res judicata and collateral estoppel from challenging defendants for alleged violations of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), the Fish and Wildlife Coordination A...
The court holds that two nonprofit organizations and an individual author lack standing to challenge the alleged failure of the Secretaries of Energy, Agriculture, and the Interior to comply with the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) in authorizing, implementing, funding, or participating in ...