Beruflich Dokumente
Kultur Dokumente
FOR PUBLICATION
v.
SUMMARY **
The panel held that: the record left little basis for denying
that climate change was occurring at an increasingly rapid
pace; copious expert evidence established that the
unprecedented rise in atmospheric carbon dioxide levels
stemmed from fossil fuel combustion and will wreak havoc
on the Earth’s climate if unchecked; the record conclusively
established that the federal government has long understood
the risks of fossil fuel use and increasing carbon dioxide
emissions; and the record established that the government’s
COUNSEL
OPINION
I.
2The plaintiffs also assert that section 201 of the Energy Policy Act
of 1992, Pub. L. No. 102-486, § 201, 106 Stat. 2776, 2866 (codified at
15 U.S.C. § 717b(c)), which requires expedited authorization for certain
natural gas imports and exports “without modification or delay,” is
unconstitutional on its face and as applied. The plaintiffs also challenge
DOE/FE Order No. 3041, which authorizes exports of liquefied natural
gas from the proposed Jordan Cove terminal in Coos Bay, Oregon.
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3 The court found that age is not a suspect class, but allowed the
equal protection claim to proceed on a fundamental rights theory.
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II.
A.
B.
1.
2.
Health & Human Servs., 271 F.3d 301, 308 (D.C. Cir.
2001)).
3.
procedural right to protect his concrete interests can assert that right
without meeting all the normal standards for redressability and
immediacy.”).
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The plaintiffs argue that the district court need not itself
make policy decisions, because if their general request for a
remedial plan is granted, the political branches can decide
what policies will best “phase out fossil fuel emissions and
draw down excess atmospheric CO2.” To be sure, in some
circumstances, courts may order broad injunctive relief
while leaving the “details of implementation” to the
government’s discretion. Brown v. Plata, 563 U.S. 493,
537–38 (2011). But, even under such a scenario, the
plaintiffs’ request for a remedial plan would subsequently
require the judiciary to pass judgment on the sufficiency of
the government’s response to the order, which necessarily
would entail a broad range of policymaking. And inevitably,
this kind of plan will demand action not only by the
Executive, but also by Congress. Absent court intervention,
the political branches might conclude—however
inappropriately in the plaintiffs’ view—that economic or
defense considerations called for continuation of the very
programs challenged in this suit, or a less robust approach to
addressing climate change than the plaintiffs believe is
necessary. “But we cannot substitute our own assessment
for the Executive’s [or Legislature’s] predictive judgments
on such matters, all of which ‘are delicate, complex, and
involve large elements of prophecy.’” Hawaii, 138 S. Ct.
at 2421 (quoting Chi. & S. Air Lines, Inc. v. Waterman S.S.
Corp., 333 U.S. 103, 111 (1948)). And, given the
complexity and long-lasting nature of global climate change,
the court would be required to supervise the government’s
compliance with any suggested plan for many decades. See
Nat. Res. Def. Council, Inc. v. EPA, 966 F.2d 1292, 1300
(9th Cir. 1992) (“Injunctive relief could involve
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they do not suggest how an order from this Court can achieve
that level, other than by ordering the government to develop
a plan. Although the plaintiffs’ invitation to get the ball
rolling by simply ordering the promulgation of a plan is
beguiling, it ignores that an Article III court will thereafter
be required to determine whether the plan is sufficient to
remediate the claimed constitutional violation of the
plaintiffs’ right to a “climate system capable of sustaining
human life.” We doubt that any such plan can be supervised
or enforced by an Article III court. And, in the end, any plan
is only as good as the court’s power to enforce it.
C.
Tel. & Tel. Co. v. Oregon, 223 U.S. 118, 149 (1912)); Luther
v. Borden, 48 U.S. 1, 36–37, 39 (1849).
III.
REVERSED.
1I agree with the majority that plaintiffs need not bring their claims
under the APA. See Franklin v. Massachusetts, 505 U.S. 788, 801
(1992); Webster v. Doe, 486 U.S. 592, 603–04 (1988).
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I.
What sets this harm apart from all others is not just its
magnitude, but its irreversibility. The devastation might
look and feel somewhat different if future generations could
simply pick up the pieces and restore the Nation. But
plaintiffs’ experts speak of a certain level of global warming
as “locking in” this catastrophic damage. Put more starkly
by plaintiffs’ expert, Dr. Harold R. Wanless, “[a]tmospheric
2
NOAA, Technical Rep. NOS CO-OPS 083, Global and Regional
Sea Level Rise Scenarios for the United States 23 (Jan. 2017).
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II.
A.
4
Available at https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/0
1-12-02-0274.
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405 U.S. 56, 74 (1972), which held Oregon’s wrongful detainer statute
governing landlord/tenant disputes constitutional. The perpetuity
principle, however, cabins the right and avoids any slippery slope. While
the principle’s goal is to preserve the most fundamental individual rights
to life, liberty, and property, it is not triggered absent an existential threat
to the country arising from a “point of no return” that is, at least in part,
of the government’s own making.
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B.
1.
....
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2.
harm based on gradually warming air temperatures and rising seas. But
the Supreme Court sidestepped such questions of the concreteness of the
plaintiffs’ injuries by finding that “[Massachusetts’s] stake in the
outcome of this case is sufficiently concrete to warrant the exercise of
federal judicial power.” Id. at 519. Here and now, the plaintiffs submit
undisputed scientific evidence that their distinct and discrete injuries are
caused by climate change brought about by emissions from fossil-fuel
combustion. They need not rely on the “special solicitude,” id. at 520,
of a state to be heard. Regardless, any distinction would go to the
concreteness or particularity of plaintiffs’ injuries and not to the issue of
redressability.
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3.
Baker v. Carr, 369 U.S. 186, 217 (1962); see also Zivotofsky
ex rel. Zivotofsky v. Clinton, 566 U.S. 189, 195–201 (2012)
(discussing and applying Baker factors); Vieth v. Jubelirer,
541 U.S. 267, 277–90 (2004) (same); Nixon v. United States,
506 U.S. 224, 228–38 (1993) (same); Chadha, 462 U.S.
at 940–43 (same). 10 In some sense, these factors are
frontloaded in significance. “We have characterized the first
three factors as ‘constitutional limitations of a court’s
jurisdiction’ and the other three factors as ‘prudential
considerations.’” Republic of Marshall Islands v. United
States, 865 F.3d 1187, 1200 (9th Cir. 2017) (quoting Corrie
See Marbury, 5 U.S. at 165–66 (“By the constitution of the United States,
the President is invested with certain important political powers, in the
exercise of which he is to use his own discretion, and is accountable only
to his country in his political character, and to his own conscience.”).
The modern incarnation of the doctrine has existed relatively unaltered
since its exposition in Baker in 1962. Although the majority disclaims
the applicability of the political question doctrine, see Maj. Op. at 31,
n.9, the opinion’s references to the lack of discernable standards and its
reliance on Rucho v. Common Cause, 139 S. Ct. 2484 (2019), as a basis
for finding this case nonjusticiable blur any meaningful distinction
between the doctrines of standing and political question.
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Baker, 369 U.S. at 217; see also Corrie, 503 F.3d at 982
(“We will not find a political question ‘merely because [a]
decision may have significant political overtones.’”)
(quoting Japan Whaling Ass’n v. Am. Cetacean Soc’y,
478U.S. 221, 230 (1986)). Rather, when detecting the
presence of a “political question,” courts must make a
“discriminating inquiry into the precise facts and posture of
the particular case” and refrain from “resolution by any
semantic cataloguing.” Baker, 369 U.S. at 217.
12 Rucho does not turn exclusively on the first Baker factor and
acknowledges that there are some areas of districting that courts may
police, notwithstanding the Elections Clause’s “assign[ment] to state
legislatures the power to prescribe the ‘Times, Places and Manner of
holding Elections’ for Members of Congress, while giving Congress the
power to ‘make or alter’ any such regulations.” Rucho, 139 S. Ct.
at 2495. Instead, Rucho holds that a combination of the text (as
illuminated by historical practice) and absence of clear judicial standards
precludes judicial review of excessively partisan gerrymanders. See
infra Part II.B.4.
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4.
III.