Articles

Earlier this month, Senator David Vitter published an op-ed arguing that the federal government’s implementation of the Endangered Species Act fails to account for negative effects on economic growth and private property rights.  Last week, Taylor Jones from WildEarth Guardians published a response.  Ms. Jones argues that the ESA has only m ...

Can a city prove intentional discrimination by relying on a disparity study whose conclusions and recommendations were lifted from another jurisdiction’s study? That’s the question city officials from Cleveland must ask themselves after reading this article from Cleveland.com. Ever since four U.S. Supreme Court justices agreed in ...

Earlier today, in In re: Polar Bear Endangered Species Act Listing & Section 4(d) Rule Litigation, a three-judge panel of the DC Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the United States Fish and Widlife Service’s decision to list the polar bear as a threatened species under the ESA.  (Pacific Legal Foundation represents several of the plain ...

As I mentioned in an earlier post, the DC Circuit’s opinion today upholding the polar bear listing relies mainly on the principle of deference to administrative decision-making that is at the so-called “frontiers of science.”  But I think it also fair to say that the court misconstrued or simply misunderstood what PLF’s mai ...

Property Rights — Water, Fish and Takings The Federal Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the dismissal on ripeness grounds of Casitas Municipal Water District v. United States.  This was the case where the district alleged that a fish ladder and water diversion required to protect endangered fish took its water rights (see picture to right ...

Should the government be constitutionally permitted to require you to compile and distribute information, for the private benefit of a private company? This important question arises in the pharmaceutical industry in the upcoming California Supreme Court case Beeman v. Anthem Prescription Management. When customers fill their prescriptions at Calif ...

The New Mexico legislature is currently debating a bill, HB 194, which would reform that state’s cumbersome Public Utility Commission. Sadly, some reform advocates mistakenly think it would “reduce or remove the barriers preventing new taxi, shuttle, bus, limo, and moving companies from opening.” In fact, it would do no such thi ...

Last week, PLF attorneys filed an amicus brief with the U.S. Supreme Court in support of the estates of Nevada ranchers, E. Wayne and Jane Hage. The Hages, and their children, have been fighting for over twenty years to preserve their water rights from federal agencies. Water rights, like those owned by the Hages, are … ...

This morning, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals agreed to rehear en banc the appeal in Natural Resources Defense Council v. Salazar.  In this case, the environmentalists challenge the failure of the Bureau of Reclamation to consult with the United States Fish and Wildlife Service and National Marine Fisheries Service when the Bureau renewed a &# ...