John Marshall Law School
Indiana University Maurer School of Law
University of Georgia School of Law
Solenex Llc V. Jewell,
2019
Alexander Blewett III School of Law at the University of Montana
Solenex Llc V. Jewell, F. Aaron Rains
Public Land & Resources Law Review
In Solenex LLC v. Jewell, the Secretary of the Interior cancelled a highly contentious oil and gas lease in Montana’s Badger-Two Medicine area, an environmentally sensitive and culturally significant area to the Blackfeet Tribe, nearly thirty years after the lease had been issued. Solenex, a Louisiana based oil and gas company and holder of the lease, brought this action to enjoin the cancellation. The District Court for the District of Columbia agreed with Solenex and found that the Secretary’s decision took an unreasonable amount of time and violated good-faith contractual obligations. On these grounds, the court found the ...
Rethinking The Federal Indian Status Test: A Look At The Supreme Court's Classification Of The Freedmen Of The Five Civilized Tribe Of Oklahoma,
2018
University of Tulsa College of Law
Rethinking The Federal Indian Status Test: A Look At The Supreme Court's Classification Of The Freedmen Of The Five Civilized Tribe Of Oklahoma, Clint Summers
American Indian Law Journal
No abstract provided.
Crow Indian Tribe V. United States,
2018
Alexander Blewett III School of Law at the University of Montana
Crow Indian Tribe V. United States, Hallee Kansman
Public Land & Resources Law Review
The protection status of the Greater Yellowstone grizzly bear continues to elicit debate and find its way into the courtroom. In Crow Indian Tribe v. United States, for the second time in the last decade, a court held the Service’s attempt to delist the Yellowstone Grizzly arbitrary and capricious. Specifically, the court found the Service’s evaluation of remnant populations, recalibration, and genetic health deficient. This case demonstrates the importance in and the resilient motivation behind preserving grizzly bear populations and genetics. As the practice of delisting a species under the Endangered Species Act continues, this case will provide ...
Brackeen V. Zinke,
2018
University of Montana
Brackeen V. Zinke, Bradley E. Tinker
Public Land & Resources Law Review
In 1978, Congress enacted the Indian Child Welfare Act to counter practices of removing Indian children from their homes, and to ensure the continued existence of Indian tribes through their children. The law created a framework establishing how Indian children are adopted as a way to protect those children and their relationship with their tribe. ICWA also established federal standards for Indian children being placed into non-Indian adoptive homes. Brackeen v. Zinke made an important distinction for the placement preferences of the Indian children adopted by non-Indian plaintiffs; rather than viewing the placement preferences in ICWA as based upon Indians ...
Energy Justice: Us And International Perspectives,
2018
Seattle University
Energy Justice: Us And International Perspectives, Carmen G. Gonzalez, Elizabeth A. Kronk Warner, Raya C. Salter
Carmen G. Gonzalez
Western Organization Of Resource Councils V. United States Bureau Of Land Management,
2018
University of Montana School of Law
Western Organization Of Resource Councils V. United States Bureau Of Land Management, Seth Sivinski
Public Land & Resources Law Review
To what extent must the BLM analyze potential climate change impacts where millions of acres of public lands and federal mineral estates are being considered for coal development? Western Organization of Resource Councils v. BLM addresses this, setting the scope for NEPA-mandated environmental impact analysis and reasonable alternative consideration by federal agencies. Judge Brian Morris of the District of Montana eschewed BLM’s assertions that considering climate impacts would be speculative, instead requiring BLM to acknowledge scientific reality and include modern climate science in its NEPA review analysis.
Highway Culverts, Salmon Runs, And The Stevens Treaties: A Century Of Litigating Pacific Northwest Tribal Fishing Rights,
2018
Alexander Blewett III School of Law at the University of Montana
Highway Culverts, Salmon Runs, And The Stevens Treaties: A Century Of Litigating Pacific Northwest Tribal Fishing Rights, Ryan Hickey
Public Land & Resources Law Review
Isaac Stevens, then Superintendent of Indian Affairs and Governor of Washington Territory, negotiated a series of treaties with Indian tribes in the Pacific Northwest during 1854 and 1855. A century and a half later in 2001, the United States joined 21 Indian tribes in filing a Request for Determination in the United States District Court for the District of Washington. Plaintiffs alleged the State of Washington had violated those 150-year-old treaties, which remained in effect, by building and maintaining culverts under roads that prevented salmon passage. This litigation eventually reached the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, which held in favor ...
Collaboration Through Nepa: Achieving A Social License To Operate On Federal Public Lands,
2018
Haub School of Environment and Natural Resources and the University of Wyoming College of Law
Collaboration Through Nepa: Achieving A Social License To Operate On Federal Public Lands, Temple Stoellinger, L. Steven Smutko, Jessica M. Western
Public Land & Resources Law Review
As demand and consumption of natural gas increases, so will drilling operations to extract the natural gas on federal public lands. Fueled by the shale gas revolution, natural gas drilling operations are now frequently taking place, not only in the highly documented urban settings, but also on federal public lands with high conservation value. The phenomenon of increased drilling in sensitive locations, both urban and remote, has sparked increased public opposition, requiring oil and gas producers to reconsider how they engage the public. Oil and gas producers have increasingly deployed the concept of a social license to operate to gain ...
Public-Private Conservation Agreements And The Greater Sage-Grouse,
2018
University of Denver Sturm College of Law
Public-Private Conservation Agreements And The Greater Sage-Grouse, Justin R. Pidot
Public Land & Resources Law Review
In 2015, the Obama Administration announced its conservation plans for the greater sage-grouse, an iconic bird of the intermountain west.Political leadership at the time described those plans as the “largest landscape-level conservation effort in U.S. history,”and they served as the foundation for a decision by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (“FWS”) that a listing of the bird was not warranted under the Endangered Species Act (“ESA”). The Trump Administration appears poised to substantially amend the plans, although an array of interested parties have urged that the plans be left intact. Regardless of the outcome of ...
Streamlining The Production Of Clean Energy: Proposals To Reform The Hydroelectricity Licensing Process,
2018
Alexander Blewett III School of Law at the University of Montana
Streamlining The Production Of Clean Energy: Proposals To Reform The Hydroelectricity Licensing Process, Travis Kavulla, Laura Farkas
Public Land & Resources Law Review
Hydroelectric power is an efficient and clean source of power. In an era when air emissions dominate public concern about the environmental effects of the energy sector, it is a paradox that among the most highly regulated energy projects are hydroelectric dams, which do not combust fuel. This is partly due to a failure of successive statutory enactments,which have transformed hydroelectric licensing from a regulatory “one-stop shop” with a single regulator, to a process chained to a bewilderingnumber of often conflicting regulatory agencies, often riven with delay. Hydroelectric licensing has also failed because its capacious standard of review encourages ...
Keeping Power In Charge: Federal Hydropower And The Downstream Environment,
2018
University of New Mexico School of Law
Keeping Power In Charge: Federal Hydropower And The Downstream Environment, Reed D. Benson
Public Land & Resources Law Review
No abstract provided.
Language Matters: Environmental Controversy And The Quest For Common Ground,
2018
Alexander Blewett III School of Law at the University of Montana
Language Matters: Environmental Controversy And The Quest For Common Ground, Scott Slovic
Public Land & Resources Law Review
No abstract provided.
Center For Biological Diversity V. Zinke,
2018
Alexander Blewett III School of Law at the University of Montana
Center For Biological Diversity V. Zinke, Ryan Hickey
Public Land & Resources Law Review
The oft-cited “arbitrary and capricious” standard revived the Center for Biological Diversity’s most recent legal challenge in its decades-long quest to see arctic grayling listed under the Endangered Species Act. While this Ninth Circuit decision did not grant grayling ESA protections, it did require the United States Fish and Wildlife Service to reconsider its 2014 finding that listing grayling as threatened or endangered was unwarranted. In doing so, the court found “range,” as used in the ESA, vague while endorsing the FWS’s 2014 clarification of that term. Finally, this holding identified specific shortcomings of the challenged FWS finding ...
Friends Of Animals V. United States Fish & Wildlife Service,
2018
Alexander Blewett III School of Law at the University of Montana
Friends Of Animals V. United States Fish & Wildlife Service, Bradley E. Tinker
Public Land & Resources Law Review
In Friends of Animals v. United States Fish & Wildlife Service, the Ninth Circuit held that the plain language of the Migratory Bird Treaty Act allows for the removal of one species of bird to benefit another species. Friends of Animals argued that the Service’s experiment permitting the taking of one species––the barred owl––to advance the conservation of a different species––the northern spotted owl––violated the Migratory Bird Treaty Act. The court, however, found that the Act delegates broad implementing discretion to the Secretary of the Interior, and neither the Act nor the underlying international conventions limit ...
Public Employees For Environmental Responsibility V. United States Epa,
2018
Alexander Blewett III School of Law at the University of Montana
Public Employees For Environmental Responsibility V. United States Epa, F. Aaron Rains
Public Land & Resources Law Review
Prior to 2016, the EPA acknowledged that human activities significantly contribute to climate change. However, on March 9, 2017, EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt announced that significant debate regarding the issue remained in the scientific community. In response to these statements, a nonprofit organization filed a FOIA request with the EPA seeking any documents or records Pruitt may have used when formulating his statements or substantiating his position. The EPA refused to comply with the request, citing undue burden and improper interrogation and this action followed. Upon review, the District Court for the District of Columbia found the plaintiff’s FOIA ...
The Problem Of Purely Procedural Preemption Presented By The Federal Hear Act,
2018
Pryor Cashman LLP, partner
The Problem Of Purely Procedural Preemption Presented By The Federal Hear Act, William L. Charron
Pepperdine Law Review
The underlying purpose of the Holocaust Expropriated Art Recovery Act of 2016 (the HEAR Act), which is to return Nazi-looted artwork to victims or their families, is undeniably laudable. Restituting Nazi-looted artwork is and has been a moral objective of this country since the conclusion of World War II. It is equally clear that victims and their families can often face obstacles to gathering evidence from the war that would demonstrate Nazi theft in court. The HEAR Act strives to address these concerns by imposing a federal statute of limitations over all state law causes of action that would enable ...
Guest Editors' Introduction To The Special Issue, Diversity In Aquatics,
2018
Rowan University
Guest Editors' Introduction To The Special Issue, Diversity In Aquatics, Angela K. Beale-Tawfeeq, Steven N. Waller Ph.D., Austin Anderson
International Journal of Aquatic Research and Education
This is the introductory editorial leading off the special issue, "Diversity in Aquatics."
Around Campus,
2018
DePaul University
Around Campus
DePaul Magazine
Reburying the Dead: Returning control of ancient remains to Native American tribes; Communicating Climate Change: DePaul professor discusses effective ways to connect with skeptical and disengaged audiences; The Great Mind of Michael Shannon
A View From American Courts: The Year In Indian Law 2017,
2018
Seattle University School of Law
A View From American Courts: The Year In Indian Law 2017, Grant Christensen
Seattle University Law Review
This Article provides a comprehensive review of Indian law for 2017. It does not include a citation to every case related to Indian law issued by the courts but tries to incorporate the majority of opinions into its catalog to provide a robust discussion of the changes in Indian law over the course of 2017. Part I of this Article provides some general statistics about Indian law in 2017. Part II focuses on activity at the U.S. Supreme Court, which is the most watched forum for Indian law cases for obvious reasons. Part III groups cases by subject area ...
“Indian” As A Political Classification: Reading The Tribe Back Into The Indian Child Welfare Act,
2018
Northwestern Pritzker School of Law
“Indian” As A Political Classification: Reading The Tribe Back Into The Indian Child Welfare Act, Allison Krause Elder
Northwestern Journal of Law & Social Policy
In the summer of 2018, the Ninth Circuit will consider an appeal from the dismissal of a constitutional challenge to the Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA). Brought by a conservative think-tank, this case frames the ICWA as race-based legislation, violating equal protection by depriving Indian children of the same procedures as non-Indian children in child custody cases. In reality, the ICWA seeks to protect the interests of tribes, Indian families, and Indian children by establishing special procedures and obligations in Indian child custody cases. On its face, the ICWA is concerned not with the race of children, but with the ...
