The court holds that legislation applying the Arizona-Idaho Conservation Act exemption from Endangered Species Act (ESA) and National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) requirements to the construction of an observatory on a site in endangered red squirrel habitat does not violate the separation of pow...

The court holds that New Jersey's self-sufficiency policy, whose goal is to eliminate the use of out-of-state disposal facilities by the year 2000, violates the Commerce Clause of the U.S. Constitution. The state implemented the policy by either rejecting long-term out-of-state disposal contracts, i...

The court directs a district court to enjoin South Dakota state officials from relitigating in state court issues that the federal circuit court has already decided concerning the permitting of a solid waste disposal facility. In SDDS, Inc. v. South Dakota, 25 ELR 20967 (1995), the circuit court eff...

The court holds that South Carolina laws that limit the amount of out-of-state waste that may be disposed of in South Carolina violate the Commerce Clause of the U.S. Constitution. One statute requires South Carolina hazardous-waste facilities to reserve space for in-state waste and caps the amount ...

The court affirms a district court determination that §2001(k)(1) of the 1995 Rescissions Act is constitutional and does not violate separation of powers by permitting Congress to resurrect timber sales that federal courts have enjoined. The district court also correctly held that "offered" sales, ...

The court holds that Washington oil spill prevention laws are not preempted by federal statute, do not violate the Commerce Clause or Foreign Affairs Clause of the U.S. Constitution, and are not improper extraterritorial restrictions. The court first holds that the language, structure, and legislati...

The court holds that the Endangered Species Act's (ESA's) prohibition on the "take" of endangered species is not unconstitutional as applied to purely local activities that affect a fly that exists only in California. The court first holds that the record clearly shows that wildlife in general, and ...

The court holds that under the open fields doctrine, state natural resource officials may enter a landowner's property to conduct a warrantless inspection of wetlands on the property without violating the landowner's Fourth Amendment rights. The court finds that the 175-acre property that the landow...

The court denies a private-property owner injunctive relief on its claim that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and EPA employees violated the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution when an EPA emergency response team entered onto the property without a warrant and removed water and ...

The court upholds Nevada county ordinances requiring landowners either to subscribe to a particular garbage collection service or to haul their garbage to an approved disposal site every seven days. The ordinances also required all landowners that cannot prove that they properly disposed of their ow...