Suit Accuses U.S. Government of Failing to Protect Earth for Generations Unborn

[alp227]

Source: The New York Times

SAN FRANCISCO — Advocates of stringent curbs on greenhouse gas emissions sued the federal government on Wednesday, arguing that key agencies had failed in their duty to protect the earth’s atmosphere as a public trust to be guarded for future generations.

Similar lawsuits are to be filed against states around the country, according to the plaintiffs, a coalition of groups concerned about climate change called Our Children’s Trust.

Most of the individual plaintiffs in the suit, filed in United States District Court in San Francisco, are teenagers, a decision apparently made to underscore the intergenerational nature of the public trust that the earth’s atmosphere represents. More novel, however, is the suit’s reliance on the public trust doctrine, which dates to Roman times.

That doctrine has been invoked in cases involving the protection of Chicago’s lakefront and of Mono Lake in the Sierra Nevada.

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/05/science/earth/05climate.html

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San Francisco...I guess that's what it takes to make a lawsuit like this!!

Meanwhile, conservatives are desperate to ban abortion to protect generations unborn. Who's more sensible?

[zalinda]

1. Cool !

[No Elephants]

2. Unless Mother Nature literally brought the suit, there's a standing issue.

Sierra Club v. Morton. Justice Douglas's dissent cites an article entitled "Should Trees Have Standing?"

Very interesting, IMO.

[eppur_se_muova]

3. I wonder how many "pro-lifers" will offer support?

After all, they care about "generations unborn" above all else ...