A U.S. District Court rejected a lawsuit filed by environmental groups against the federal government claiming its policies allowing fossil fuel development and use violate the plaintiffs’ constitutional rights to wilderness unaffected by human activity.
The Animal Legal Defense Fund, Seeding Sovereignty, and six individuals sued the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Department of Interior, and other federal agencies for violating a right they claimed was guaranteed under the First, Fifth, and Ninth amendments to the U.S. Constitution, by supporting the fossil fuel industry, whose actions are causing the climate to change in ways that damage the health, beauty, and accessibility of wilderness areas.
Recognizing their lawsuit was stretching the boundaries of the law, the plaintiffs’ brief asked U.S. District Court Judge Michael McShane of the District Court of Oregon to engage in “nothing short of revolutionary thinking” by recognizing a “right to wilderness.”
In his July 31 ruling, McShane, nominated to the Oregon District Court in 2012 by then-president Barack Obama, declined the plaintiffs’ request to expand the law through judicial decree.
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