The U.S. Supreme Court handled an all-time high of over 7,700 cases in the 1993-1994 Term.¹ The number and variety of environmental law cases on which the Court acted reflects this achievement. General numbers-counting analyses that estimate each Justice's political position as conservative, centrist, or liberal based on the Justices' voting patterns have concluded that the Court maintained a generally conservative stance.² The outcomes in some of the Court's significant environmental decisions, however, belie such appraisals.³

States and environmentalists won a case allowing a state agency to consider instream flow in addressing a state water quality certification application under § 401 of the Federal Water Pollution Control Act (FWPCA),⁴ and an environmental group won a case requiring that municipal solid waste incinerator combustion ash be treated as hazardous waste under Subtitle C of the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA).⁵ In other cases, the Court frustrated an industry attempt to recover attorneys fees incurred in a Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA) cost recovery action,⁶ a state's efforts to control or limit the amount of waste imported into the state,⁷ and municipalities' efforts to maintain flow control over garbage generated within their boundaries.⁸ In another case, the Court established a new two-step test to be applied in certain takings analyses.⁹ The federal government, industry, and citizen groups all faced setbacks when the Court denied petitions for certiorari in particular cases.