The Forest Service says the Appalachian Trail isn’t “land” in a pipeline fight at SCOTUS

It’s not every Supreme Court brief that goes off the beaten legal path, supplementing jurisprudence with humor and spicing up statutory interpretation with devastating wit. But the filing from environmentalists fighting the US Forest Service (USFS) over its grant of a license for a gas pipeline through the Appalachian Trail is one such gem. Sadly, the substance of the case isn’t amusing. Whether you believe national and natural treasures should be protected from pesky energy companies, or that nature-loving tree-huggers should thank the heavens for businesses willing to drill deep and spend billions of dollars to someday deliver consumer savings, the case highlights the growing tension between government, industry, and the people over how to handle American land.

Here’s what happened. The USFS granted Atlantic Coast Pipeline a license to run a natural gas pipeline under a portion of the Appalachian Trial, which is a national treasure and the world’s longest hiking-only path, stretching nearly 2,200 miles from Georgia to Maine. The license is for land within the George Washington National Forest in Virginia and West Virginia, and the trail runs through these woods. Cowpasture River Preservation Association and other environmentalist groups challenged the license in court, arguing that the USFS lacked the authority for the grant because the trail is actually National Park Service (NPS) land, not territory belonging to the National Forest System.

The government and the company argue that there will be minimal disruption to trail walkers, as the drilling will be deep and begin out of sight of the scenic route. The environmentalists counter that the starlight will be dimmed, the natural experience marred, and that there is potential long-term harm. But the only question before the high court is how to read a bunch of different statutes to determine who really has rights over the Appalachian Trail here...The petitioners—USFS and Atlantic Coast Pipeline—and the respondents, the trail’s advocates, are in lockstep on some critical points. All acknowledge that if the Appalachian Trail counts as land administered by the park service, then no agency has authority to grant a gas license across the federal territory. All also concede that the entire Appalachian Trail is administered by the Secretary of the Interior, who delegated the duty to the NPS. It’s also understood that land administered for the interior secretary by NPS counts as “land” in the national park system. Still, the parties’ paths diverge on important issues. Most notably, they disagree about whether the Appalachian Trail territories count as “land,” based on three statutes read together—The Mineral Leasing Act, the National Trail Systems Act, and the National Park Service Organic Act. And they also disagree on the extent to which any other statutes might apply.To begin with, the federal government provides a pretty funny premise, and the wry humor in the environmentalists’ responding brief would be impossible without this initial paradoxical offer from USFS acting as a sort of straight man...The federal government basically argues that the Appalachian Trail isn’t “land” for the purposes of the case. Instead it’s a “footpath” or a “trail” that happens to be administered by the National Park Service.

READ ENTIRE POST