Public Lands and Natural Resources Law: LACJR........Last update: May 1, 1996
Environmental Law

Injunctions

In litigation involving public lands, natural resources and the environment in general, injunctions are an important equitable remedy. Injunctions are based on immediate irreparable injury and the inadequacy of legal remedies (money) to right legal wrongs... Village of Gambell, ___U.S. ___ (1987).

Preliminary or Temporary Injunctions

These are injunctions granted at the institution of a suit, to restrain the defendant from doing or continuing some act, the right to which is in dispute, and which may either be discharged or made perpetual, according to the result of the controversy, as soon as the rights of the parties are determined (Federal Rules of Civil Procedure 65)

Permanent Injunction

(Often considered the same as a Perpetual Injunction)

An injunction intended to remain in force until the final termination of the particular suit; a final or perpetual injunction is one which finally disposes of the suit, and is indefinite in time. (Black's Law Dictionary -- the views of practicing attorneys or other authorities on these definitions are welcome)

Requirements for a preliminary injunction:

  1. Likelihood of success on the merits.
  2. Threat of immediate and irreparable harm or injury absent the injunction.
  3. Balance of the equities; ie will there be substantial harm to others caused by issuance of the injunction?
  4. The public interest must be furthured.

Illustrative caselaw

National Wildlife Federation v. Burford, 835 F.2d 305 (D.C. Cir. 1987).

Facts: Then Secretary of the Interior James Watt, in the Reagan Administration (early 1980'S), was attempting to terminate protective classifications on 160 million acres and to revoke withdrawals on 20 million acres to open up federal lands for development. DOI was ignoring FLPMA land use planning requirements. The District Court granted a preliminary injunction to stop the process.

Issue: D.Ct.: Should an injunction issue? This Appeals. Ct: Did the D.Ct. err or abuse its discretion in granting the injunction?

Held: No abuse of discretion. This court affirmed the lower court, sustaining the injunction.

Rationale: The Court's summary analysis of the requirements for a preliminary injunction in this case follows:

1. Likelihood of success on the merits.

Success is likely because:

  1. The Secretary had failed to follow FLPMA requirements of LUP's, as described in FLPMA and its own (BLM) regulations, and
  2. The agency failed to permit public participation in the decision-making process to terminate classifications and withdrawals.
2. Threat of irreparable harm absent the injunction.

Permanent destruction of wildlife habitat, air and water quality, natural beauty, and other environmental and aesthetic values and interest could result without the injunction, because the Department's actions removed the only absolute shield against private exploitation of these lands. Statutes and regulations do not prohibit development in place, they can only regulate it.

3. Balance of the equities; i.e. will there be substantial harm to others caused by issuance of the injunction?

No, because permanent loss of environmental resources and aesthetic values, not to mention loss of access to the lands themselves, would clearly outweigh any burdens put on third parties by the injunction.

4. Furthering the public interest.

The public interest would be furthered because FLPMA (legislated public policy) had been ignored, and the public has a vested interest in the specified orderly procedures for removing certain federal controls over the federal lands. Permanent destruction might occur without the injunction.

Sources:

The above case was artfully exerpted in Coggins's 1990 case supplement to the second edition of the casebook noted immediately below. It did not appear in the third edition. But See Coggins, et al, 1993, Federal Public Land and Resources Law, 3rd ed., Foundation Press; pp. 357-8 for some discussion of the issue in the notes.

NOTE re immediate and irreparable injury:

Immediate and irreparable injury to the plaintiffs is what is required; not, for example, fear and speculation about harms in the indefinite future (such as wolf depredations on livestock near Yellowstone National Park). Wyoming Farm Bureau Federation, et al. v. Bruce Babbitt, 94 F. Supp. 286 (D. Wyo. 1995), aff'd by 10th Cir.

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