Time, as San Francisco columnist Herb Caen used to say, is nature's way of making sure that everything doesn't happen at once. But even time had its hands full over the past several weeks as a spate of courthouse news all but engulfed us, and all of it was good. Earthjustice staff were the primary lawyers in most of the cases and active participants in all of them. We'll leave the analysis for another day, but here are the highlights.

March 23: A federal judge in West Virginia ruled that permits issued by the Army Corps of Engineers for four mountaintop removal mines in that state violate the federal Clean Water Act. The ruling could affect dozens of permits pending throughout Appalachia and help rein in one of the most destructive mining practices of all time.
March 30: A federal judge in San Francisco overturned an attempt by the Bush administration to rewrite national forest rules in such a way as to all but eliminate the public's opportunity to participate in decisions involving logging on the national forests.
Later that same day a federal judge in Seattle ruled that the Forest Service had misrepresented the views of many scientists who argued that a proposed rewrite of the rules protecting salmon streams in the Pacific Northwest would harm fish. The court chided the Forest Service for the misrepresentations and found the rewritten rules illegal.
April 2: The Supreme Court handed us not one but two major wins. The first, hailed by attorney Howard Fox as "one of the most important environmental cases in history," was the first time the court had addressed global warming. The Environmental Protection Agency had taken the position that carbon dioxide is not a pollutant and therefore the agency had no power to regulate emissions under the Clean Air Act. The court rejected the administration's position and ordered EPA to consider mandatory reductions in carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases emitted by cars and trucks.
The second involved utility company attempts to evade the so-called "new source review" provisions of the Clean Air Act regarding upgrades to several power plants operated by Duke Power. Earthjustice's role in this case involved coordinating the writing and submission of a string of friend-of-the-court briefs and making sure the justices were aware of the significance of a parallel case that Earthjustice litigated at the appeals court for the District of Columbia.
April 9: The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a lower court ruling that the government's management of the Columbia and Snake rivers violates the Endangered Species Act. This, according to The Oregonian, "came as close as sitting judges do to legally ridiculing the U.S. government's claims, among them defending dam operations that essentially counted dead fish as if they were alive."

Note the similarities: in every case the Bush administration was trying to evade or ignore federal laws and regulations. And in every case it fell to Earthjustice, other nonprofit organizations, and states to go to court to enforce the law against the very agencies that are supposed to be protecting us.

Not surprisingly, on Saturday, April 14th, the New York Times -- noting this same series of court rulings -- editorialized as follows:

"When the history of this administration's endless tussles with environmental law and practice is written, the various advocacy groups that challenged the administration in court at nearly every step of the way will occupy a major role."

We can all be proud of the key role Earthjustice has played in this effort to enforce and uphold the law. We could not have done it without your unwavering support. And we have much more to do, but it is important to celebrate what we have accomplished thus far.

Vawter "Buck" Parker, Executive Director
buckparker@earthjustice.org