Law Commons^™

From Words To Action: The Impact And Legal Status Of The 2006 National Wildlife Refuge System Management Policies, Robert L. Fischman

Articles by Maurer Faculty

On June 26, 2006, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) issued three new final policies governing the conservation of the national wildlife refuge system. These new agency manual provisions nearly complete an implementation project that began shortly after Congress enacted an organic statute in 1997 for management of the refuges. This article briefly reviews the significance of the 1997 legislation and places the new policies in the context of the statutory framework. It then discusses the most important aspects of the policies in terms of both practical refuge management and broader trends in natural resources law. The article evaluates …

What Is Natural Resources Law?, Robert L. Fischman

Articles by Maurer Faculty

A recent flurry of new natural resources law casebooks, coming a quarter-century since the publication of the last significant new teaching materials, is an occasion to revisit the boundaries that define the field. The similarities among the casebooks are stronger than their differences, and represent a consensus about what composes natural resources law. The published teaching materials as well as an informal poll of natural resources law professors show a substantial overlap between natural resources and environmental law course coverage. Administrative implementation of statutes dominates both subjects. Both courses typically cover environmental impact analysis and endangered species protection. The new …

The National Wildlife Refuge System And The Hallmarks Of Modern Organic Legislation, Robert L. Fischman

Articles by Maurer Faculty

This article explores the origins and precise meaning of the term "organic act," which is widely used in public land law. The evolution in the meaning of the term reflects larger shifts in the role of legislation in public resource management. The article illustrates this with an analysis of the 1997 Refuge Improvement Act, a substantial revision of the charter for the Refuge System and the first major statute governing public land management enacted since the 1970s.

The Refuge System's "dominant use" regime is an important model for sustainable resource management. The article describes this regime in the context of …

The Epa's Nepa Duties And Ecosystem Services, Robert L. Fischman

Articles by Maurer Faculty

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