If we want to think about changes in local sustainability over the last 10 years, perhaps the best place to start is with Al Gore. In 1992, just before the Rio Earth Summit and before he was to be tapped as a vice presidential candidate, then-Senator Gore published a treatise on the environment called Earth in the Balance.

Thousands of tired, nerve-shaken, over-civilized people are beginning to find out that going to the mountains is going home; that wilderness is a necessity; and that mountain parks and reservations are useful not only as fountains of timber and irrigating rivers but as fountains of life.

—John Muir (1898)

A walk in the park is one of our finest cultural opportunities, a value that people expect to find available in their community.

—National Association of State Park Directors

"The task . . . is to become a co-worker with nature in the reconstruction of the damaged fabric . . . ."

—William Perkins Marsh (1864)

"This is a day of redemption and of hope. It's a day when the limits of what is possible have been greatly expanded because we are showing our children that restoration is possible, that we can restore a community to its natural state."

—Secretary of the Interior Bruce Babbitt (1995)

The Defenders of Wildlife Judicial Accountability Project—undertaken with the assistance of the Vermont Law School Clinic for Environmental Law and Policy—seeks to fill a data void on the environmental record of President George W. Bush and his Administration by analyzing all reported environmental cases in which the Bush Administration has presented legal arguments regarding an existing environmental law, regulation, or policy before federal judges, magistrates, or administrative tribunals.

I. Introduction

In the 19th century, doctors prescribed Soothing Syrup for cranky babies. The syrup was actually laudanum, which is opium, dissolved in water. While it did quiet and calm unruly behaved children, the side effects included addiction and death.¹ Currently, Soothing Syrup prescriptions are on the rise as more and more 21st century doctors prescribe psychotropic drugs to misbehaving children.

A more substantive precautionary principle of international law is evolving as new treaties articulate new measures of precaution in different contexts. Although there is considerable controversy over how to articulate or define a precautionary "principle" of law, the goal is to ensure that the mere lack of scientific knowledge about risks cannot justify a failure to take appropriate precautions. Where we have sufficient evidence of risk, we often take precautions, despite a lack of certainty about those risks.

In a recent article reviewing the U.S. Supreme Court's environmental decisions over the last 30 years (1969-1999), Professor Richard Lazarus argues that "the Justices have never fully appreciated environmental law as a distinct area of law."¹

A recent headline on the front page of the Wall Street Journal hailed the opening of the nation's first "butterfly bank." The "deposits" in this unusual bank are conservation credits earned by preserving an important area of habitat for the Quino checkerspot butterfly, an endangered species restricted to California. The bank's intended customers are other landowners who hope to develop other sites where the butterfly occurs. In order to do so, they can buy credits from the private entrepreneur who established the butterfly bank.

Introduction

The 1999 National Nuclear Security Administration Act (NNSA Act) threatens to reverse 20 years of reforms and court decisions intended to bring the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) into compliance with environmental laws and regulations. The NNSA Act, enacted in the wake of allegations of spying at Los Alamos nuclear weapons laboratory in New Mexico, established a semi-autonomous agency within DOE—the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA). The NNSA operates nine laboratories and facilities within the U.S. nuclear weapons complex.