The Battle for the Right to Challenge Environmental Edicts in Court Continues
2nd April 2016
United States Army Corps of Engineers v. Hawkes Co., Inc. pits a family-owned business that harvests and processes peat for golf courses against the federal government. Hawkes Company was harvesting peat from a bog on privately owned property in Minnesota in compliance with state environmental laws when the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers put a halt to their operation, citing the Clean Water Act, which gives the federal government jurisdiction over all navigable waters in the United States. The Corps demand that the company submit to its permitting process before continuing.
The strange thing about this, and other similar cases involving the Clean Water Act, is that the Supreme Court will not rule on whether or not the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is correct in deeming the property a wetland subject to federal regulation, but whether or not the property owners even have a right to challenge the environmental agency’s decree in court.
SCOTUS adjudicated a simliar dispute between landowners and the Environmental Protection Agency back in 2012 in Sackett v. EPA. Reason TV profiled the Sackett’s case in the video above. While the agency involved is different, the principle is the same: Do landowners have the right to challenge orders from environmental agencies in court, or is such behavior illegal defiance deserving of thousands of dollars in fines a day?