Articles

Justice Stevens' environmental law legacy

April 16, 2010 | By PACIFIC LEGAL FOUNDATION

Author: Damien M. Schiff Grist.com has this fairly well-balanced piece by Doug Kendall lauding retiring Justice John Paul Stevens' judicial decisions dealing with environmental law issues over his three-decade-plus tenure on the Supreme Court.  The article's thesis is that Justice Stevens universally practiced "deference to ...

Articles

PLF files suit against EPA for failure to reconsider the Endangerment Finding

October 07, 2010 | By PACIFIC LEGAL FOUNDATION

Author:  Theodore Hadzi-Antich Pacific Legal Foundation filed a lawsuit this week challenging EPA's refusal to reconsider its finding under the Clean Air Act that greenhouse gasses, mostly carbon dioxide, endanger public health and welfare.  In violation of a statute that has been on the books for decades, EP ...

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EPA turns 40, but I'm not sending a birthday card

December 02, 2010 | By PACIFIC LEGAL FOUNDATION

Author:  Damien M. Schiff Today's Wall Street Journal has an oped by Lisa Jackson, Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, celebrating the agency's 40-year history of enforcement of federal environmental laws, including the Clean Water Act and the Clean Air Act.  I'm sure that one can find any number of "s ...

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PLF says feds are illegally speeding in push for greenhouse regs for vehicles

January 31, 2011 | By PACIFIC LEGAL FOUNDATION

Author: Ted Hadzi-Antich Pacific Legal Foundation has called on the Obama Administration to halt its illegal rush to implement greenhouse emissions rules for heavy duty and medium duty vehicles.   The proposed standards should be submitted for independent scientific scrutiny, as required by law, and comply with mandated procedures ...

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Can it really be a victory if it's unanimous?

June 20, 2011 | By PACIFIC LEGAL FOUNDATION

Author:  Damien M. Schiff Today the Supreme Court issued its decision in American Electric Power Co. v. Connecticut, a global warming nuisance lawsuit that presented important questions on the role of the federal judiciary in greenhouse gas regulation.  PLF filed a brief in the case arguing that the federal judiciary could not hear the ...

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What is the REINS Act?

March 01, 2012 | By DAMIEN SCHIFF

I found myself asking the titular question earlier this week while testifying at a Joint Western Caucus hearing on Capitol Hill.  During his principal comments, Senator Mike Lee, junior senator from Utah, suggested that one reason why EPA and other agencies have run amok is that Congress has granted them significant rulemaking power with little o ...

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More analysis on Kivalina

September 26, 2012 | By DAMIEN SCHIFF

Last week, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the dismissal of the Native Village of Kivalina’s tort damages claim against a large collection of the country’s major energy producers.  (PLF submitted an amicus brief in support of the defendants).  Kivalina had argued that the defendants’ greenhouse gas emissions had cont ...

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Earth Jurisprudence?

December 20, 2012 | By DAMIEN SCHIFF

The fiftieth anniversary this year of Rachel Carson‘s Silent Spring has led me not only to read that foundational tome of modern enviromentalism, but also to reflect on the extent to which today’s modern environmental movement has changed from the days of Carson and other movement founders.  Perhaps a good example of the thought behind ...

Articles

Cert sought in global warming nuisance case

March 28, 2013 | By DAMIEN SCHIFF

In Native Village of Kivalina v. ExxonMobil Corp., the Ninth Circuit held that the Clean Air Act displaces any otherwise existing federal law of public nuisance.  (PLF filed an amicus brief supporting the energy companies).  Consequently, the court’s ruling eliminates the Village’s tort lawsuit, which sought damages from the defendant ...