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Monday, April 18, 2011

Courts - Indiana Attorney General and Harvard's Laurence Tribe in agreement

Both have written opinion pieces on the upcoming argument before the SCOTUS in the case of American Electric Power Co. Inc. v. Connecticut.

First, here is Lyle Denniston's preview of Tuesday's argument, from SCOTUSblog, plus a link to the case page, with all the background material, including the link to an amicus "Brief for the States of Indiana, Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, South Dakota, Utah, West Virginia, and Wyoming in Support of Petitioner."

Here is the letter by AG Greg Zoeller, as it appears in the April 17th Evansville Courier & Press, under the heading "The separation of powers must be preserved." A quote:

But at its core is a concept that dates to the very founding of our Constitution: The separation of powers of our three branches of government.

In our brief we contend federal district courts are not the venues to decide inherently political questions that belong instead within the legislative and executive branches.

Here is an earlier, related ILB entry from Sept. 10, 2010.

And here, in the Boston Globe's April 16th issue, is a long article headed "Take it to climate court? Global warming lawsuits are a misuse of the judiciary branch," authored by Laurence H. Tribe. Some quotes:

Congress, through the Clean Air Act and other measures, has empowered the Environmental Protection Agency to regulate greenhouse gases, and that agency has begun to do so, prodded by a Supreme Court ruling in favor of Massachusetts when the state sued the EPA to compel it to take up the problem. The courts should reject the political and administrative roles that would be thrust upon them by litigants dissatisfied with Congress’s decision to entrust the EPA with this challenging mission — or by those dissatisfied with the efforts of the president and the State Department to engage in the international diplomacy required to cope with an obviously international problem. * * *

The inherently limited power and influence of the judicial branch must be preserved for the elaboration of constitutional and statutory texts and legal principles, the protection of politically vulnerable groups and unpopular rights, and the preservation of the structural boundaries of our legal system. That power and influence are squandered when courts are asked to serve as political agents and as social and scientific engineers.

Posted by Marcia Oddi on April 18, 2011 10:52 AM
Posted to Courts in general | Environment