For generations, the Morgan family owned mineral rights to oil-rich land in Santa Barbara County with the expectation that responsible development would allow them to leave behind something lasting—financial security, independence, and opportunity for future generations. Today, siblings John and Melinda Morgan serve as the stewards of that legacy.
In 2024, California changed the rules. SB 1137 imposed a sweeping ban on new oil drilling within 3,200 feet of homes, schools, hospitals, community centers, or virtually any business open to the public. Existing wells were subjected to layers of new restrictions. The effect was not regulation; it was prohibition.
Because the Morgans’ mineral estate sits within a newly designated “health protection zone,” their lawful family enterprise—built around a resource that powers daily life for hundreds of millions of Americans—was suddenly rendered unusable. Overnight, the state eliminated any productive use of the Morgans’ mineral estate.
The imbalance goes even further. SB 1137 punishes property owners while leaving the public free to build wherever it chooses. Any new development within 3,200 feet of the Morgans’ mineral estate instantly destroys its economic value, with no limits, no notice, and no compensation. The government invites others to eliminate the Morgans’ property rights simply by moving closer.
This is not a novel constitutional problem. Courts have long recognized that regulations that go “too far” are takings in everything but name. In Pennsylvania Coal Co. v. Mahon (1922), the Supreme Court rejected the idea that states may outlaw productive use of purchased mineral rights without compensation. SB 1137 repeats that mistake on a far broader scale.
The Morgans care deeply about clean air and environmental responsibility—just as California claims to. But stewardship does not require erasing property rights or forcing families to subsidize state policy. Prosperity, innovation, and environmental care are not mutually exclusive—and pretending otherwise only entrenches scarcity.
SB 1137 does more than destroy one family’s legacy. It entrenches an ideology that treats private ownership as a problem, abundance as a threat, and prohibition as progress—while ignoring innovation, technological advancement, and constitutional limits.
Represented free of charge by Pacific Legal Foundation, the Morgans are challenging SB 1137 to reaffirm a basic principle: Americans do not lose their property simply because the government prefers a different policy outcome.
What’s At Stake?
- The American Dream includes the freedom to put property to productive use—to create opportunity, support communities, and build a legacy for the next generation.
- When the government wipes out all economically viable use of private land, it has taken that property under the Fifth Amendment and must pay just compensation.
- Environmental policy does not get a constitutional exemption. The costs of public policy must be borne by the public, not forced onto a small group of property owners by regulatory fiat.
