Pacific Legal 2

===

note 2 nodes; tag 6/14 pacleg

one of first? CA CoC cf lanay on pwl memo

see cedar pts

beaten for years on wetlands till 6-3 supermaj sotus

marc g UFW

===

9 24 the lever podcast series

RR promo for pacific legal

trailer: Master Plan | Listen Now

ep 4

3 mtg orlando dallas and --- same time? jerry ford vp

white of US steel

devos amway pal, joe coors/ AILES

In this episode, we definitely answer that question for the very first time. Master Plan lead producer Jared Jacang Maher has uncovered troves of never-before-reported evidence that proves corporate executives and politicians didn’t just read Powell’s memo — they acted on it.

This includes three secret meetings of a “Powell Memo Task Force” — including one at Disney World. These gatherings drew together America’s most powerful businessmen, a future president, and an ambitious young media consultant named Roger Ailes.

By the end of 1974, the Powell Memo had transformed from a set of ideas into an actual master plan — and the pieces were in place to carry out a decades-long assault on American democracy.

---

===

new

pac leg no lnx no lnx in orig but vid

claims ufw/arlb withdrew charge complaint against fowler but somehow damaged/disrputed?

Supreme Court affirms property rights for California fruit growers

Cedar Point Nursery v. Hassid

Won: U.S. Supreme Court affirms right to exclude trespassers from your property

In the early morning hours in fall 2015—during Northern California’s frenetic harvest season—Cedar Point Nursery was at full staff. Five hundred employees were hard at work in trim sheds, tending to the strawberry plants that would soon ship to growers throughout the country.

They were suddenly shocked when a crowd burst through the doors and made their way through the building, barking through bullhorns that the workers needed to join the UFW. Some workers were so scared and intimidated that they left the property, but most stayed on the job, uninterested in union membership.

Union organizers invade Cedar Point’s property and disrupt business operations. Footage captured by employees.

Similarly, for three straight days, UFW organizers tried to storm Fresno-based Fowler Packing Company, one of the nation’s largest growers of table grapes and citrus. Its 2,500 employees and their families already enjoy workplace perks typically promised by labor unions: safe and immaculate facilities, free health care with an on-site health clinic, and free meals any time of the day at an on-site cafeteria.

Mike Fahner, owner of Cedar Point Nursery, similarly treats his employees well, with many of them staying for twenty years or longer. Seasonal workers keep coming back to Cedar Point year after year. With little demand from his staff in joining the union, he consulted with the police and an attorney to stop the harassment of his business and was stunned to discover that the union’s property invasion was legally authorized under California law.

A state regulation requires all of California’s agricultural employers to allow such trespassing by union organizers. The California Agricultural Labor Relations Board created its so-called Union Access Regulation in 1975 so union officials can spend up to three hours a day, 120 days a year trying to recruit new union members—on their employers’ turf. Mike wondered how anyone could manage a business with the possibility of such severe disruptions hanging over them.

The regulation is a hold-over from the days when farm workers had little access to media or other means of communications and often lived on their employers’ property during busy times of the season. These days, seasonal workers stay at nearby hotels. And most workers have access to hundreds of Spanish-speaking radio stations and other media outlets, cell phones and smartphones, and the internet. Nevertheless, the board insists its regulation is still necessary to reach these employees.

Unions, however, have no special right to invade private property and disrupt commercial operations, and property owners have a fundamental right to exclude trespassers. Government can’t make a regulation violating that right even if it limits the hours when it applies.

Represented by PLF free of charge, the owners of Cedar Point Nursery and Fowler Packing Company asked the U.S. Supreme Court to invalidate California’s unlawful union access regulation.

WHAT’S AT STAKE?

The Constitution forbids government from requiring you to allow unwanted strangers onto your property. And union activists are no exception. California’s regulation that allows them to do so violates property owners’ fundamental right to exclude trespassers.

CASE TIMELINE

September 01, 2021

Final Stipulated Judgment After Remand

United States Supreme Court

June 23, 2021

Opinion

United States Supreme Court

March 05, 2021

Reply Brief for Petitioners

United States Supreme Court

January 07, 2021

Center for Constitutional Jurisprudence Amicus Brief on the Merits in Support of Petitioners

United States Supreme Court

January 07, 2021

States’ Amicus Brief on the Merits in Support of Petitioners

United States Supreme Court

FOR MEDIA INQUIRES:

Kate Pomeroy

MEDIA DIRECTOR

Attorneys

Joshua P. Thompson - Director of Equality and Opportunity Litigation

DIRECTOR OF EQUALITY AND OPPORTUNITY LITIGATION

Chris Kieser - Attorney

ATTORNEY

Damien M. Schiff - Senior Attorney

SENIOR ATTORNEY

RELATED CASES

Beachfront

Government reneges on building permit, unlawfully strips property rights

MIKE BORDELON AND BREEZY SHORES, LLC V. BALDWIN COUNTY

California man protect his houseboat and his rights

California man fights government overreach to protect his houseboat and his rights

DANIEL KNIGHT V. RICHARDSON BAY REGIONAL AUTHORITY

Row homes along the Royal Street in the French Quarter

Fighting for timely just compensation for government-damaged property

ARIYAN INC. V. SEWERAGE & WATER BOARD OF NEW ORLEANS

Serene Virginia farm nestled amidst rolling hills and lush green fields

Hunters’ ‘right to retrieve’ tramples property owners’ right to exclude trespassers

MEDEIROS V. VIRGINIA DEPARTMENT OF WILDLIFE RESOURCES

Relaxing massage experience with a cozy massage table

Local government wields unannounced, warrantless search power over private businesses and home practitioners

VONDRA V. CITY OF BILLINGS

Constitutional Rights of public workers

California law keeps workers ignorant of their constitutional rights

JACKSON V. NAPOLITANO

contractor

Bulldozing unfair, illegal union-rigged construction scheme

MINNESOTA ASSOC. BUILDERS AND CONTRACTORS V. MINNEAPOLIS PUBLIC SCHOOL DISTRICT

mma 6 23

Right-wing media are attempting to discredit mainstream coverage and reactions around the Supreme Court’s recent decision to limit bodies of water protected under the Clean Water Act.

On May 25, the Supreme Court ruled unanimously in favor of wealthy Idaho couple Michael and Chantell Sackett in Sackett v. Environmental Protection Agency, after a 14-year legal battle in which they fought to do construction near protected wetlands without a permit. All nine justices ultimately agreed they could do so, however, their reasoning differed and concurring opinion on the scope of the case was split 5-4.

Five conservative justices ruling for the majority decided that definitions previously laid out in the 51-year-old Clean Water Act were the problem, considerably narrowing the scope of which bodies of water must be protected. According to the environmental law nonprofit EarthJustice, which filed anamicus brief in the case, the new decision means that “as many as half of the 118 million acres of wetlands in the U.S. are no longer protected by the Clean Water Act, embracing the decades-long demands of mining companies, the fossil fuel industry, reckless developers, and other big polluters.”

Mainstream media coverage of the ruling rightfully highlighted this serious outcome. Democratic lawmakers including Sens. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) called out the decision’s radical implications and suggested it was driven by a partisan conservative agenda. Other experts pointed out that the majority decision ignores the best available science on how pollutants move through ecosystems.

In response, right-wing media celebrated the decision and slammed its critics, claiming that the unanimous ruling was intentionally being ignored to mislead the public and fit the narrative that conservative, Trump-appointed justices were making controversial decisions. In reality, the outcome of Sackett v. EPA was nothing if not controversial. Even Trump-appointed Justice Brett Kavanaugh opted to side with the court’s three liberal justices, saying the majority’s decision to redefine what is protected under the Clean Water Act went against scientific evidence.

Right-wing media attacks focus on the majority’s decision to gut the Clean Water Act

Right-wing media attempted to expose those who called out the very real impacts of gutting the Clean Water Act and implied that the only decision that mattered — and the only one that should be publicized — was the unanimous ruling in favor of the Sacketts. Suggesting otherwise, according to them, was a gross misrepresentation of the ruling.

These allegations started on May 25 in response to Schumer’s tweet attacking the “MAGA Supreme Court” for the decision to “erode our country’s environmental laws,” adding that “this ruling will mean more polluted water, and more destruction of wetlands.” Twitter users accused Schumer of lying by highlighting the unanimous ruling in favor of the Sacketts, and even added a community note clarifying the decision. Echoing the online backlash, right-wing media including Fox News and Newsmax piled on Schumer as well.

Trending Politics owner Collin Rugg: “I was today years old when I found out Ketanji Brown Jackson was a MAGA Republican.”Twitter, [5/29/23]
Conservative precious metals investment influencer account Wall Street Silver pushed back on Schumer’s tweet: “It was a 9-0 unanimous opinion.”Twitter, [5/27/23]
A Daily Wire op-ed claimed that Schumer labeling the decision as “MAGA” was a “smear” against the Supreme Court:“Democrats attempt to smear anybody who goes against their agenda as a ‘MAGA’ extremist — even if those individuals are liberal members of the United States Supreme Court.” Daily Wire, [5/27/23]
Right-wing comedian Tom Shillue, filling in for Fox’s Greg Gutfeld, said the decision was “about as MAGA as a tofu hotdog with a Bud Light."“Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer took time out from never having a real job and slammed yesterday's Supreme Court ruling,” Shillue said. “Shockingly, Schumer described the decision as the work of a MAGA court. This despite the fact the decision was 9-0. Yeah, that’s MAGA — that’s about as MAGA as a tofu hotdog with a Bud Light.” Fox News, *Gutfeld!*, [5/26/23]
Shillue later added that “there are plenty of liberals still on the court,” while Fox News contributor Kat Timpf asked if Schumer even bothered to look at the ruling.“It's just ‘MAGA’ and it doesn’t even make any sense,” Timpf said. “I mean, you know that. Did he not even bother to look at the 9-0?" Fox News, *Gutfeld!*, [5/26/23]
Newsmax co-host Bianca de la Garza dismissed Schumer’s comment and the 5-4 split.“To be very clear, all nine judges unanimously agreed that the EPA overstepped its authorities,” she said. “I guess any reason to throw in MAGA, he’ll take.” Newsmax, *John Bachman Now*, [5/26/23]
Fox News host Sean Hannity: “*IT WAS UNANIMOUS, CHUCK!* ‘All 9 judges agreed that the EPA overstepped its authority and that the plaintiffs’ property should not be subject to EPA regulation.’”Twitter, [5/26/23]
Fox Business host Liz MacDonald accused Schumer of politicizing the ruling: “This was a unanimous ruling, so that means Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, Elena Kagan, Sonya Sotomayor joined in this unanimous ruling. So are they MAGA too? Why is this politicizing everything?” Fox Business, *The Evening Edit*,[5/26/23]
Townhall accused Democrats of having “grossly misled on the outcome of the case.” “Democrats are not taking the news well, to the point that they've grossly misled on the outcome of the case,” Townhall wrote. “In a tweet from his official account, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) lamented about how the ‘MAGA Supreme Court is continuing to erode our country's environmental laws,’ despite how, again, it was unanimous.” Townhall, [5/25/23]
National Review senior writer Dan McLaughlin mocked Schumer over the 9-0 decision: “Unanimous SCOTUS decision written by George W. Bush appointee. Outcome joined by GHW Bush appointee, 2d GW Bush appointee, 2 Obama appointees, & a Biden appointee. The 3 Dems joined a concurring opinion written by a Trump appointee. Chuck Schumer: That's so MAGA!” Twitter, [5/25/23]

Right-wing media also attacked The Washington Postand Bloomberg for not highlighting the unanimous decision more prominently, or even falsely stated that this was not even mentioned.

Radio host Erick Erickson: “You’d never know from Bloomberg that the decision was unanimous.”Twitter, [5/25/23]
Red State blogger known as Bonchie: “This is the first seven paragraphs of the Post's write-up. Can you tell it was actually a 9-0 unanimous decision?” Twitter, [5/25/23]
Former New York Post columnist and Daily Wire content creator Frank Fleming: “What the hell is wrong with the Washington Post misleading people like that?” “I have to defend Schumer a bit here,” Fleming wrote. “Everyone is dunking on him for this being a unanimous decision, but the Washington Post article he links doesn't mention that and calls it a 5-4 decision (when actually, it's separate concurring opinions). What the hell is wrong with the Washington Post misleading people like that?” Twitter [5/25/23]

Why the 5-4 split between the concurring justices matters

It’s true that all nine justices ruled in favor of the Sacketts. Specifically, they found that the Army Corps of Engineers and the EPA did not have jurisdiction over this particular property. But despite what right-wing media say, the differences in their reasoning are important.

Initially, the Sacketts filed a lawsuit against the EPA because the agency ordered them to remove sand and gravel fill from the lot where they wanted to build a house, arguing that it was on protected wetlands and they would need to return the area to its natural state. The couple brought the case to the Supreme Court for the first time in2012 after lower courts sided with the EPA, maintaining that the property was subject to the Clean Water Act and the Sacketts did indeed need permits to continue construction. The Supreme Court at the time ruled in favor of the Sacketts’ right to challenge the EPA’s order.

Aided by the Cato Institute and Americans for Prosperity, both of which were founded by the fossil fuel billionaire Koch brothers, as well as other industry groups, the Sacketts managed to get their case in front of the Supreme Court for a second time. They were represented by thePacific Legal Foundation,which has received funding from the fossil fuel industry and its allies and also fought to weaken the Clean Water Act back in 2006.

This time, five far-right justices didn’t just rule in favor of the Sacketts — they went so far as to adopt the narrowest possible definition of which waters are protected by the Clean Water Act, completely changing how the law has functioned for the past 51 years. Kavanaugh, along with three liberal justices, argued that this decision went too far. Though they wrote a concurring opinion, he and three other justices fundamentally disagreed with Justice Samuel Alito’s reading of the law, which would not protect wetlands unless they have a “continuous surface connection” to bodies of water. Kavanaugh explained why that doesn’t make sense in his concurring opinion (citations omitted):

“Because of the movement of water between adjacent wetlands and other waters, pollutants in wetlands often end up in adjacent rivers, lakes, and other waters. Natural barriers such as berms and dunes do not block all water flow and are in fact evidence of a regular connection between a water and a wetland. … The scientific evidence overwhelmingly demonstrates that wetlands separated from covered waters by those kinds of berms or barriers, for example, still play an important role in protecting neighboring and downstream waters, including by filtering pollutants, storing water, and providing flood control. In short, those adjacent wetlands may affect downstream water quality and flood control in many of the same ways that adjoining wetlands can."

Right-wing media’s gripes ignoring the concurring opinion and framing the Supreme Court’s unanimous ruling as key to the case are completely bad-faith attempts to gaslight the public into thinking that the decision was less controversial than it actually was. This narrative directly benefits the industries that were so keen to help gut a bedrock environmental law while refusing to accept clear scientific evidence that is inconvenient to their bottom line. As Earthjustice puts it, the effort was part of “a coordinated push by industry polluters that want to blow a hole in the Clean Water Act, bulldoze cherished wetlands, and contaminate the country’s streams with waste from mining, oil and gas, and agro-industrial operations as they see fit, just to maximize their profits.”

This isn’t the first time this court has delivered a victory to polluters. In June 2022, the court’s conservative majority issued a devastating ruling in West Virginia v. EPA that severely limited the EPA’s power to make power plants cut the toxic pollution that is driving the climate crisis.

ref2 thin

https://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Pacific_Legal_Foundation

evil bit not wrong LNX BELOW

pacific Legal Foundation (PLF) is a libertarian public interest law firm founded in 1973 that represents clients at no charge. 1 PLF’s founders believed public interest law had drifted into supporting, rather than challenging, government authority. 2 They intended the firm to be an antidote to that drift by defending the rights of individuals and work to contain government power within constitutional limits. 3 The firm represents individuals seeking to enforce their rights against governments in five practice areas: property rights,4 free speech,5 economic liberty,6 equality before the law,7 and separation of powers. 8 In 2020, PLF had 117 active cases directly representing clients across these five areas of litigation. 9

Pacific Legal Foundation has won 12 cases for clients whom it directly represented before the U.S. Supreme Court. 10 In one example, Palazzolo v. Rhode Island, the PLF client was Anthony Palazzolo, described by the New York Times as a “father of six” and a “former auto wrecker.” 11 Palazzolo prevailed in a decision that created a higher likelihood of access to the courts for landowners seeking to prove the value of a property has been reduced due to a government regulation. 12 In Knick v. Township of Scott, PLF represented Rose Knick, a 70-year-old single retiree who wanted access to federal courts so she could challenge the constitutionality of a local township graveyard ordinance that required her to provide public access to her farm. 13

In the Palazzolo victory against the state of Rhode Island in 2001, Pacific Legal Foundation attorneys prevailed against future U.S. Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), who was then the Rhode Island attorney general. 14 That outcome has been followed by nearly two decades of public criticism of PLF from Whitehouse. 15 In September 2018, while questioning then-Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, Whitehouse. asserted that PLF had hired Palazzolo as a “prop in order to make arguments trying to direct the Court in a particular direction.” 16 Later that day, Palazzolo’s attorney responded: “we didn’t hire Anthony. He hired us (for free).” 17 Similarly, in a 2016 speech on the floor of the Senate, Whitehouse called PLF a “creepy front group.” 18 And in a 2019 essay Whitehouse once again asserted that PLF had “handpicked the plaintiff” in Knick v. Township of Scott. 19 Recounting Whitehouse’s history of criticism, Palazzolo’s attorney wrote that Whitehouse’s disdain for right-of-center public interest litigation was “the real reason why Senator Whitehouse doesn’t like Pacific Legal Foundation.” 20

CONTENTS

Background

Personnel

Litigation Areas

Property Rights

Free Speech

Economic Liberty

Equality Before the Law

Separation of Powers

Supreme Court Victories

Knick v. Township of Scott, Pennsylvania (2019)

Weyerhaeuser/Markle v. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (2018)

Minnesota Voters Alliance v. Mansky (2018)

National Association of Manufacturers v. Department of Defense (2018)

U.S. Army Corps of Engineers v. Hawkes (2018)

St. Johns River Water Management District v. Koontz (2013)

Sackett v. Environmental Protection Agency (2012)

Rapanos v. United States (2006)

Palazzolo v. Rhode Island (2001)

Suitum v. Tahoe Regional Planning Agency (1997)

Keller v. State Bar of California (1990)

Nollan v. California Coastal Commission (1987)

Finances

Virgin Islands Subpoena Controversy

Conflict with Sheldon Whitehouse

“Creepy Front Groups” Allegation

Palazzolo Case

References

Form 990 Information

Background

PLF was founded in 1973 by staffers of California’s then-governor (and future Republican president) Ronald Reagan. The goal of these founders was to emulate the original public interest law firms that defended constitutional rights such as free speech, civil liberties, and equal protection under law. PLF’s creators believed that by the early 1970s public interest law had drifted into a “collectivist” direction that too often supported, rather than challenged, government power. PLF’s founders expressed hope that it would be an antidote to that drift: a public interest law firm that defended individual liberty and worked to contain government authority within constitutional limits. 22

Personnel

As of 2021, the Pacific Legal Foundation had more than 80 employees, including at least 35 attorneys. 26 Not including the senior leadership team, 12 other individuals were listed with the title of “senior attorney.” 27

In 2021, the PLF executive leadership team had four members:29

Steven D. Anderson, president and chief executive officer: Steven Anderson became president and chief executive officer of PLF in 2016. Prior to 2016 he worked for 12 years at the Institute for Justice (IJ) and before leaving was IJ’s executive vice president and chief financial officer. He received his law degree from Wake Forest University. 30

James S. Burling, vice president of legal affairs: James Burling has worked as an attorney at PLF since obtaining his law degree from the University of Arizona College of Law in 1983. For more than a decade before 1983 he was an exploration geologist. 31

John M. Groen, executive vice president and general counsel: John Groen began working as a PLF employee in 1987, and later left to work in the private sector and serve as a trustee on the PLF board. In 2015, he returned from private practice to return to litigation work for PLF. His law degree is from the McGeorge School of Law. 32

Chad Wilcox, chief operating officer and chief financial officer: Chad Wilcox began working for PLF as the COO/CFO in 2017. Prior to employment with PLF, he worked for the Institute of Economic Affairs (a British free market think tank) and the Institute for Humane Studies. He has an M.Ed in organizational leadership from Vanderbilt University. 33

Litigation Areas

PLF also files amicus briefs on behalf of similar clients whose cases are directly represented by other attorneys. 35

PROPERTY RIGHTS

Rafaeli, LLC v. Oakland County: PLF defended clients suing what it referred to as a “predatory government foreclosure” and “home equity theft.” Oakland County, Michigan, and other local governments in the state were seizing homes for unpaid taxes and keeping all proceeds. PLF client Uri Rafaeli had a home seized and sold over an unintentionally unpaid tax debt of $8.41, with all proceeds from the sale of the home reverting to the county. In July 2020, the Michigan Supreme Court ruled in favor of Rafaeli and invalidated the foreclosure theft policy. 36

Zito v. North Carolina Coastal Resource Commission; Town of Nags Head: PLF defended a couple that was prevented from rebuilding their vacation cottage after it was destroyed by fire in 2016. Declaring the property as part of a “no-build zone,” state and local governments refused to issue building permits to replace the home. The litigation was ongoing as of May 2021. 37

FREE SPEECH

Kotler v. Webb: PLF’s client was a professor of First Amendment law at the University of Southern California who was a fan of the London-based Fulham Football Club. The California Department of Motor Vehicles refused the professor’s request for a vanity license plate with the letters “COYW.” The letters are the abbreviation for the Fulham team cheer, based on the club’s white jerseys: “Come on you whites!” The California DMV refused the request, asserting that the letters represented a racially offensive statement. In September 2019, the DMV settled the case and granted the license plate request. 38

Chef Geoff’s v. The Virginia Alcoholic Beverage Control Authority: PLF represented a Virginia restauranteur, Geoff Tracy, who was not allowed to advertise the happy hours at his establishment due to a state law prohibiting advertisements promoting special drink pricing and happy hours. Because happy hours and special drink pricing were otherwise legal behavior, PLF argued on behalf of Tracy that this violated his First Amendment right to speak freely and truthfully about his business practices. In response to the litigation, Virginia amended state law to permit the advertising. 39

ECONOMIC LIBERTY

Fontenot v. Hunter, Attorney General of Oklahoma: PLF’s client, a Native American woman who was a member of Virginia’s Patawomeck tribe, was an artist who sold in many states what she promoted as “American Indian-made” art and jewelry. In 2016, the state of Oklahoma enacted legislation limiting the legal use of the “American Indian-made” identification to only those artists who belong to federally recognized Native American tribes. Because PLF’s client was a member of a tribe recognized by her state, but not the federal government, she was precluded from using the identification when selling her art in Oklahoma. In March of 2019, a federal district court in Oklahoma ruled against the restriction as it applied to PLF’s client. In April 2021, the same artist, represented again by PLF, won a similar (though more limited) ruling against a similar law in the state of Missouri. 40

Legacy Medical Transport, LLC and Phillip Truesdell v. Adam Meier, et al.: PLF’s client was Legacy Medical Transport, a family-owned non-emergency ambulance company in Ohio servicing the Ohio-Kentucky border area. The business shuttles patients from their homes to medical appointments and back. Legacy Medical was precluded from providing this service for patients needing service to or from Kentucky because that state’s Certificate of Need law artificially restricted the number of ambulance services permitted in the marketplace. The federal lawsuit filed by Legacy Medical’s owners alleged a violation of their constitutional right to make a living free of government regulations that irrationally show favoritism to one competitor over another. The case was still pending in federal court as of May 2021. 41

EQUALITY BEFORE THE LAW

D.M. & Z.G. v. Minnesota State High School League: PLF’s client was a 16-year-old high school student who was denied the opportunity to join his school’s competitive dance team because he was a boy. On his behalf, PLF sued the Minnesota State High School League, alleging that excluding boys from competitive dance teams based on their gender was a violation of the constitution’s equal protection guarantee and the federal Title IX civil rights law. In March 2019, a federal court granted an injunction that permitted the boy to dance with the team. 42

Robinson v. Wentzell: PLF’s clients were the families of African-American and Hispanic students seeking admission to the magnet schools run by the school district in Hartford, Connecticut. A government-mandated quota system required that 25 percent of the magnet school slots be filled by students of white or Asian descent. Maintaining the 25/75 ratio artificially restricted access for African-American and Hispanic students, whose available slots at the school were contingent upon how many white and Asian students enrolled. Insufficient interest from white and Asian families resulted in seats going unfilled by any student, despite African American and Hispanic families wanting them. 43

SEPARATION OF POWERS

Sackett v. Environmental Protection Agency: On behalf of their client, PLF attorneys won a unanimous decision at the U.S. Supreme Court in 2012 that expanded access to federal courts for landowners seeking to challenge the wetlands jurisdiction of the Environmental Protection Agency. In March 2020, the EPA rescinded a compliance order against the PLF client that had been part of the basis for the initial litigation. 45 (This case is discussed in further detail under the “Supreme Court Victories” section).

U.S. Army Corps of Engineers v. Hawkes: On behalf of their client, PLF attorneys won a unanimous decision at the U.S. Supreme Court in 2018 that expanded access to federal courts for landowners seeking to sue federal regulatory agencies. Because of this victory, PLF’s client was able to subsequently win a lawsuit lower federal court that overturned a regulatory determination made by the Army Corps. 46 (This case is discussed in further detail under the “Supreme Court Victories” section).

Supreme Court Victories

Through May of 2021, fourteen cases decided by the U.S. Supreme Court had involved clients directly represented by Pacific Legal Foundation attorneys. PLF won 12 of the cases. 47

KNICK V. TOWNSHIP OF SCOTT, PENNSYLVANIA (2019)

Knick reversed the Supreme Court’s 1985 Williamson County decision, which had prevented property owners from direct access to a federal court when claiming a takings violation under the U.S. Constitution. PLF client Rose Knick, the owner of a Pennsylvania farm containing a suspected graveyard, had been forced by a local government ordinance to open her land to public access. The Williamson County standard had prevented Knick from direct access to a federal court to defend her rights under the federal constitution. 48

WEYERHAEUSER/MARKLE V. U.S. FISH AND WILDLIFE SERVICE (2018)

Weyerhaeuser/Markle was a ruling against a decision by federal regulators to designate 1,500 acres in Louisiana as a critical habitat for the dusky gopher frog. Federal regulators claimed the Endangered Species Act gave them the authority to impose the designation, which restricted use of the property and thus diminished its value. PLF client Edward Poitevent owned 95 percent of the property, with the remaining land owned by the Weyerhaeser timber and real estate firm. The facts of the case showed that no dusky gopher frog had been found in the state for more than 50 years. The Supreme Court ruled unanimously that the government had overstepped its legal authority by imposing the critical habitat designation. 49

MINNESOTA VOTERS ALLIANCE V. MANSKY (2018)

Minnesota Voters Alliance was a free speech case involving PLF client Andy Cilek. A Minnesota election law prohibited voters from displaying any recognizable political opinion on their clothing while at a polling place. In 2010, Cilek wore a t-shirt with the motto “Don’t tread on me” to his polling place. He was prevented from voting for several hours because of this attire, and a poll worker threatened him with prosecution. In a 7-2 ruling the Supreme Court held that the state’s dress code violated Cilek’s First Amendment rights. 50

NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF MANUFACTURERS V. DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE (2018)

In National Association of Manufacturers, the Supreme Court held unanimously that landowners challenging “Waters of the United States” regulations imposed under authority of the Clean Water Act could retain a six-year window to claim harm and sue in federal court. The ruling reversed an Environmental Protection Agency attempt to shrink the window to 120 days. 51

U.S. ARMY CORPS OF ENGINEERS V. HAWKES (2018)

PLF represented a family business in Minnesota that harvested peat moss for use as golf course putting greens. The Army Corps of Engineers issued a jurisdictional determination that the government had authority under the Clean Water Act to regulate the business property as a wetland. The Supreme Court’s unanimous ruling allowed the family business to directly challenge the Army Corps’ determination in a federal court. After this ruling, a lower federal court heard the case and the peat moss company prevailed. The lower court ruled their property was not subject to federal jurisdiction. 54

ST. JOHNS RIVER WATER MANAGEMENT DISTRICT V. KOONTZ (2013)

PLF represented Coy Koontz, a Florida landowner who was seeking a permit to develop his property. As a condition for granting the permit, the St. Johns River Water Management District insisted that Koontz engage in mitigation (improving water drainage) on an unrelated parcel of property owned by the District and not contiguous with the Koontz property. The mitigation cost estimates ranged from $90,000 to $150,000. The Supreme Court ruled that the District’s conditions violated the takings clause of the U.S. Constitution and that regulators cannot require landowners to pay for work unrelated to their land as a condition for granting land use permits. 55

SACKETT V. ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY (2012)

PLF represented Chantell and Michael Sackett, who owned a residentially-zone half-acre lot in an existing subdivision on which they began to build a three-bedroom home. The Environmental Protection Agency deemed the property subject to wetlands regulation, ordered the land restored to its prior condition, and threatened the Sacketts with $75,000 daily fines if they did not comply. The government agency also demanded several costly permitting and other conditions as necessary before the home could be built — expenses that were estimated to exceed the value of the anticipated home. 56

When the Sacketts attempted to sue the federal government to challenge the order, the EPA claimed there was no right to judicial review of an Agency wetlands determination. Lower federal courts upheld the EPA’s position, but the U.S. Supreme Court ruled unanimously that failing to allow the Sacketts to sue violated their due process rights. According to PLF, this was the first time in 40 years that a federal court had allowed a court challenge to the EPA’s jurisdiction in this area. Eight years of litigation ensued. In March 2020, the EPA rescinded the compliance order. 57

RAPANOS V. UNITED STATES (2006)

PALAZZOLO V. RHODE ISLAND (2001)

In a 5-4 ruling the Supreme Court ruled that the right to challenge a regulatory taking does not expire with transfer of the title to the land. The majority said that accepting Rhode Island’s position would mean that a “State would be allowed, in effect, to put an expiration date on the Takings Clause.” Ruling that this “ought not to be the rule” the Court majority opinion held that “[f]uture generations, too, have a right to challenge unreasonable limitations on the use and value of land.” 60

SUITUM V. TAHOE REGIONAL PLANNING AGENCY (1997)

KELLER V. STATE BAR OF CALIFORNIA (1990)

NOLLAN V. CALIFORNIA COASTAL COMMISSION (1987)

PLF represented Marilyn and Patrick Nollan, owners of an oceanfront lot who desired to replace a small one-story home on the property with a larger two-story residence. As a condition of granting the building permit the California Coastal Commission required them to surrender one-third of their land to the government. The state agency argued the larger home would impose a “psychological barrier” to the public’s view of the ocean. A 5-4 majority of the Supreme Court ruled that government must prove a more convincing public purpose before demanding ownership of private property. The majority opinion accused the state of attempting an “out-and-out plan of extortion” against the Nollans. 63

Finances

PLF reported total expenses of $16.5 million for the year ending June 2020. 65

The recordkeeping service FoundationSearch shows nearly $2 million in donations from 86 different foundations to PLF for 2018. All but five of the foundations contributed $100,000 or less. Grants of $5,000 or less comprised 48 of the 86 foundation donors shown in the database. 67

FoundationSearch shows PLF’s largest foundation donor for tax year 2018 was $313,865 from the Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund, a donor-advised fund. A donor-advised fund manages charitable accounts through which donors can distribute gifts to charities of their choice while receiving immediate tax benefits. Many of the largest, such as Fidelity, exist to serve the clients of a large investment firm, rather than a particular charitable cause or ideological agenda. Fidelity is the largest such fund in the United States. 68

Virgin Islands Subpoena Controversy

Pacific Legal Foundation was one of the organizations listed in the subpoena. A Washington Times report revealed that PLF and 68 other “academic institutions and free market think tanks” included in the subpoena were also listed on the “#ExxonSecrets” website hosted by Greenpeace. The newspaper asserted the possibility that the attorney general had directly cribbed from the left-wing climate policy’s website because the subpoena’s listing and the Greenpeace list were “in virtually the same order.” 71

Speaking for PLF in a May 2016 report in theWashington Times, vice president of legal affairs James Burling told the newspaper that the attorney general’s subpoena was “unprofessional, irresponsible and reckless” because it used “unverified screed from a Greenpeace site as the basis for his subpoena, putting the listed entities into the cross-hairs of a politically driven investigation.” 72

ExxonMobil fought the subpoena, which it declared “unreasonably burdensome and intrusive.” The U.S. Virgin Islands’ attorney general withdrew the legal demand in June 2016. 74

Conflict with Sheldon Whitehouse

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) has been a frequent critic of PLF.

“CREEPY FRONT GROUPS” ALLEGATION

A poster placed behind Whitehouse by a senate aide as he was speaking asserted that ExxonMobil had given $10,000 to PLF.The poster did not allege a quid pro quo between the $10,000 contribution and PLF’s decision to argue that carbon dioxide was a natural substance that makes life possible. The Pacific Legal Foundation’s tax filing for 2014 showed total grants and contributions of $12,965,856 and net assets of $44,565,295. 77 78

In a response, Pacific Legal Foundation attorney James Burling noted that the facts about carbon dioxide in the quote selected by Whitehouse were “completely true and not a single scientist on the planet would deny it.” Burling also criticized Whitehouse for ignoring the very next sentence in the petition, which read as follows: “Certain prominent scientific organizations have concluded that atmospheric emissions of carbon dioxide from manmade sources contribute to global climate change.” Burling argued this context was critical because “nowhere in the petition do we raise any doubt about the science of global warming” [emphasis in original] or “even mention that others have cast any doubt on the science.” 79

PALAZZOLO CASE

Prior to becoming a U.S. Senator, Whitehouse was the attorney general of Rhode Island. In 2001 he unsuccessfully represented the state before the Supreme Court in Palazzolo v. Rhode Island. The Pacific Legal Foundation represented Anthony Palazzolo, described by the New York Times as a “father of six” and a “former auto wrecker.” Anthony Palazzolo prevailed in a decision that created a higher likelihood of access to the courts for landowners seeking to prove the value of a property has been reduced due to a government regulation. 80 81

Whitehouse began: “You will often see briefs brought by groups like for instance, the Pacific Legal Foundation. Are you familiar with that group?”83

“I’ll take your description,” replied Kavanaugh. 84

Whitehouse continued:85

“They get money from right wing conservative and corporate interests and they look for cases around the country that they believe they can use to bring arguments before the Court. I argued against them in the Supreme Court at one point, they came all the way across the country to the shores of Winnapaug Pond, Rhode Island, to hire a client whose case they could take to the Supreme Court with a purpose to make a point… and it causes me to think that sometimes the true party in interest is actually not the named party before the Court but rather the legal group that has hired the client and brought them to the Court more or less as a prop in order to make arguments trying to direct the Court in a particular direction.” 86

The PLF lawyer also noted that “most of our donations come from regular people, not large “dark money” corporate donors that the Senator likes to rail against” and that the mission of public interest litigation “is about representing the Anthony Palazzolos of the world against government that has forgotten its mission is to protect the rights of the people.” 88

Whitehouse resurrected his Palazzolo criticism again in July 2019, following the Supreme Court’s Knick v. Township of Scott decision, another case in which PLF successfully represented a small landowner. In an essay for The National Law Journal, Whitehouse referenced “the Pacific Legal Foundation, which handpicked the plaintiff in Knick.” The essay did not mention the name of the plaintiff—Rose Knick—and portrayed the decision in her favor as “a massive victory for the partisan donor interests seeking to control our courts.” 90

At the time of the decision, Rose Knick was a 70-year-old single retiree resisting a local township graveyard ordinance that required her to provide public access to her farm. 91

References

“History.” Pacific

evil but

ref 1 6 23

https://www.influencewatch.org/non-profit/pacific-legal-foundation/

acific Legal Foundation (PLF) is a libertarian public interest law firm founded in 1973 that represents clients at no charge. https://pacificlegal.org/history/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-0" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">1 PLF’s founders believed public interest law had drifted into supporting, rather than challenging, government authority. https://pacificlegal.org/history/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-1" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">2 They intended the firm to be an antidote to that drift by defending the rights of individuals and work to contain government power within constitutional limits. https://pacificlegal.org/history/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-2" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">3 The firm represents individuals seeking to enforce their rights against governments in five practice areas: property rights,https://pacificlegal.org/property-rights/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-3" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">4 free speech,https://pacificlegal.org/free-speech-and-association/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-4" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">5 economic liberty,https://pacificlegal.org/economic-liberty/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-5" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">6 equality before the law,https://pacificlegal.org/equality-before-the-law/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-6" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">7 and separation of powers. https://pacificlegal.org/separation-of-powers/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-7" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">8 In 2020, PLF had 117 active cases directly representing clients across these five areas of litigation. https://pacificlegal.org/about/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-8" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">9

Pacific Legal Foundation has won 12 cases for clients whom it directly represented before the U.S. Supreme Court. https://pacificlegal.org/about/" title="" aria-describedby="qtip-9" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">10 In one example, Palazzolo v. Rhode Island, the PLF client was Anthony Palazzolo, described by the New York Times as a “father of six” and a “former auto wrecker.” https://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/17/us/a-property-rights-case-tests-wetland-curbs.html " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-10" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">11 Palazzolo prevailed in a decision that created a higher likelihood of access to the courts for landowners seeking to prove the value of a property has been reduced due to a government regulation. https://www.cato.org/blog/takings-clause-has-no-expiration-date-0 " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-11" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">12 In Knick v. Township of Scott, PLF represented Rose Knick, a 70-year-old single retiree who wanted access to federal courts so she could challenge the constitutionality of a local township graveyard ordinance that required her to provide public access to her farm. https://pacificlegal.org/ms-knick-goes-to-washington-again/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-12" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">13

In the Palazzolovictory against the state of Rhode Island in 2001, Pacific Legal Foundation attorneys prevailed against future U.S. Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), who was then the Rhode Island attorney general. https://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/17/us/a-property-rights-case-tests-wetland-curbs.html " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-13" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">14 That outcome has been followed by nearly two decades of public criticism of PLF from Whitehouse. https://pacificlegal.org/public-interest-litigation-senator-whitehouse-and-the-kavanaugh-hearings/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-14" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">15 In September 2018, while questioning then-Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, Whitehouse. asserted that PLF had hired Palazzolo as a “prop in order to make arguments trying to direct the Court in a particular direction.” https://pacificlegal.org/public-interest-litigation-senator-whitehouse-and-the-kavanaugh-hearings/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-15" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">16 Later that day, Palazzolo’s attorney responded: “we didn’t hire Anthony. He hired us (for free).” https://pacificlegal.org/public-interest-litigation-senator-whitehouse-and-the-kavanaugh-hearings/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-16" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">17 Similarly, in a 2016 speech on the floor of the Senate, Whitehouse called PLF a “creepy front group.” http://floor.senate.gov/MediaPlayer.php?view_id=2&clip_id=1943 " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-17" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">18 And in a 2019 essay Whitehouse once again asserted that PLF had “handpicked the plaintiff” in Knick v. Township of Scott. https://www.whitehouse.senate.gov/news/op-eds/knick-picking-why-a-recent-scotus-ruling-signals-a-new-day " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-18" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">19 Recounting Whitehouse’s history of criticism, Palazzolo’s attorney wrote that Whitehouse’s disdain for right-of-center public interest litigation was “the real reason why Senator Whitehouse doesn’t like Pacific Legal Foundation.” https://pacificlegal.org/public-interest-litigation-senator-whitehouse-and-the-kavanaugh-hearings/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-19" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">20

Background

Pacific Legal Foundation (PLF) is a libertarian public interest law firm based in Sacramento, California. It has additional offices in Florida, the state of Washington, and Washington, D.C. It represents clients “pro bono,” at no charge to the client. https://pacificlegal.org/history/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-20" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">21

Pacific Legal Foundation has won 12 cases for clients that it directly represented before the U.S. Supreme Court, with six of the wins occurring between 2012 and 2019. PLF portrays its success record at the nation’s highest court as comparable with that of the American Civil Liberties Union, though PLF notes that it has a smaller staff and resources than the ACLU. (In its 2019 IRS tax filing the ACLU reported $144.5 million in total expenses, versus $16.5 million total expenses reported on Pacific Legal Foundation’s 2019 IRS filing). https://pacificlegal.org/about/" title="" aria-describedby="qtip-22" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">23 https://pacificlegal.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/2019-2020-irs-form-990.pdf.pdf " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-23" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">24 https://www.aclu.org/sites/default/files/field_document/2019_aclu_form_990_public_disclosure_copy.pdf " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-24" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">25

Personnel

As of 2021, the Pacific Legal Foundation had more than 80 employees, including at least 35 attorneys. https://pacificlegal.org/about/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-25" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">26 Not including the senior leadership team, 12 other individuals were listed with the title of “senior attorney.” https://pacificlegal.org/staff/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-26" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">27

PLF is governed by a 19-member board of trustees. As of 2021, most of the board membership appeared to be either entrepreneurs, attorneys, or executives from small businesses, with 12 of the 19 residing in California. The board chairman was Greg M. Evans of California, whose business affiliation was as the president and general manager of Evans Management Services. https://pacificlegal.org/board-of-trustees/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-27" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">28

In 2021, the PLF executive leadership team had four members:https://pacificlegal.org/staff/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-28" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">29

Steven D. Anderson, president and chief executive officer: Steven Anderson became president and chief executive officer of PLF in 2016. Prior to 2016 he worked for 12 years at the Institute for Justice (IJ) and before leaving was IJ’s executive vice president and chief financial officer. He received his law degree from Wake Forest University. https://pacificlegal.org/staff/steven-anderson/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-29" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">30
James S. Burling, vice president of legal affairs: James Burling has worked as an attorney at PLF since obtaining his law degree from the University of Arizona College of Law in 1983. For more than a decade before 1983 he was an exploration geologist. https://pacificlegal.org/staff/james-burling/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-30" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">31
John M. Groen, executive vice president and general counsel: John Groen began working as a PLF employee in 1987, and later left to work in the private sector and serve as a trustee on the PLF board. In 2015, he returned from private practice to return to litigation work for PLF. His law degree is from the McGeorge School of Law. https://pacificlegal.org/staff/john-groen/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-31" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">32
Chad Wilcox, chief operating officer and chief financial officer: Chad Wilcox began working for PLF as the COO/CFO in 2017. Prior to employment with PLF, he worked for the Institute of Economic Affairs (a British free market think tank) and the Institute for Humane Studies. He has an M.Ed in organizational leadership from Vanderbilt University. https://pacificlegal.org/staff/chad-wilcox/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-32" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">33

Litigation Areas

Pacific Legal Foundation directly represents clients who allege governments have violated their constitutional rights. On behalf of these clients, PLF has sued the federal government, state governments and local governments. In 2020, PLF had 117 active cases across five primary areas of litigation. https://pacificlegal.org/about/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-33" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">34

PLF also files amicus briefs on behalf of similar clients whose cases are directly represented by other attorneys. https://pacificlegal.org/about/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-34" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">35

PROPERTY RIGHTS

Rafaeli, LLC v. Oakland County: PLF defended clients suing what it referred to as a “predatory government foreclosure” and “home equity theft.” Oakland County, Michigan, and other local governments in the state were seizing homes for unpaid taxes and keeping all proceeds. PLF client Uri Rafaeli had a home seized and sold over an unintentionally unpaid tax debt of $8.41, with all proceeds from the sale of the home reverting to the county. In July 2020, the Michigan Supreme Court ruled in favor of Rafaeli and invalidated the foreclosure theft policy. https://pacificlegal.org/case/rafaeli-llc-v-oakland-county/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-35" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">36

Zito v. North Carolina Coastal Resource Commission; Town of Nags Head: PLF defended a couple that was prevented from rebuilding their vacation cottage after it was destroyed by fire in 2016. Declaring the property as part of a “no-build zone,” state and local governments refused to issue building permits to replace the home. The litigation was ongoing as of May 2021. https://pacificlegal.org/case/zito-v-north-carolina-coastal-resource-commission-town-of-nags-head/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-36" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">37

FREE SPEECH

Kotler v. Webb: PLF’s client was a professor of First Amendment law at the University of Southern California who was a fan of the London-based Fulham Football Club. The California Department of Motor Vehicles refused the professor’s request for a vanity license plate with the letters “COYW.” The letters are the abbreviation for the Fulham team cheer, based on the club’s white jerseys: “Come on you whites!” The California DMV refused the request, asserting that the letters represented a racially offensive statement. In September 2019, the DMV settled the case and granted the license plate request. https://pacificlegal.org/case/kotler-v-webb/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-37" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">38

Chef Geoff’s v. The Virginia Alcoholic Beverage Control Authority: PLF represented a Virginia restauranteur, Geoff Tracy, who was not allowed to advertise the happy hours at his establishment due to a state law prohibiting advertisements promoting special drink pricing and happy hours. Because happy hours and special drink pricing were otherwise legal behavior, PLF argued on behalf of Tracy that this violated his First Amendment right to speak freely and truthfully about his business practices. In response to the litigation, Virginia amended state law to permit the advertising. https://pacificlegal.org/case/chef-geoffs-and-geoff-tracy-v-jeffrey-painter/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-38" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">39

ECONOMIC LIBERTY

Fontenot v. Hunter, Attorney General of Oklahoma: PLF’s client, a Native American woman who was a member of Virginia’s Patawomeck tribe, was an artist who sold in many states what she promoted as “American Indian-made” art and jewelry. In 2016, the state of Oklahoma enacted legislation limiting the legal use of the “American Indian-made” identification to only those artists who belong to federally recognized Native American tribes. Because PLF’s client was a member of a tribe recognized by her state, but not the federal government, she was precluded from using the identification when selling her art in Oklahoma. In March of 2019, a federal district court in Oklahoma ruled against the restriction as it applied to PLF’s client. In April 2021, the same artist, represented again by PLF, won a similar (though more limited) ruling against a similar law in the state of Missouri. https://pacificlegal.org/court-allows-native-american-artist-truthfully-advertise-work/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-39" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">40

Legacy Medical Transport, LLC and Phillip Truesdell v. Adam Meier, et al.: PLF’s client was Legacy Medical Transport, a family-owned non-emergency ambulance company in Ohio servicing the Ohio-Kentucky border area. The business shuttles patients from their homes to medical appointments and back. Legacy Medical was precluded from providing this service for patients needing service to or from Kentucky because that state’s Certificate of Need law artificially restricted the number of ambulance services permitted in the marketplace. The federal lawsuit filed by Legacy Medical’s owners alleged a violation of their constitutional right to make a living free of government regulations that irrationally show favoritism to one competitor over another. The case was still pending in federal court as of May 2021. https://pacificlegal.org/case/legacy-medical-transport-v-adam-meier/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-40" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">41

EQUALITY BEFORE THE LAW

D.M. & Z.G. v. Minnesota State High School League: PLF’s client was a 16-year-old high school student who was denied the opportunity to join his school’s competitive dance team because he was a boy. On his behalf, PLF sued the Minnesota State High School League, alleging that excluding boys from competitive dance teams based on their gender was a violation of the constitution’s equal protection guarantee and the federal Title IX civil rights law. In March 2019, a federal court granted an injunction that permitted the boy to dance with the team. https://pacificlegal.org/case/d-m-z-g-v-minnesota-state-high-school-league/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-41" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">42

Robinson v. Wentzell: PLF’s clients were the families of African-American and Hispanic students seeking admission to the magnet schools run by the school district in Hartford, Connecticut. A government-mandated quota system required that 25 percent of the magnet school slots be filled by students of white or Asian descent. Maintaining the 25/75 ratio artificially restricted access for African-American and Hispanic students, whose available slots at the school were contingent upon how many white and Asian students enrolled. Insufficient interest from white and Asian families resulted in seats going unfilled by any student, despite African American and Hispanic families wanting them. https://pacificlegal.org/case/robinson-v-wentzell/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-42" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">43

The federal lawsuit asserted the quota system was a violation of the 14th Amendment’s equal protection guarantee. In response to the litigation, the state rescinded the quota and allowed the open magnet school seats to be filled by African American students. https://pacificlegal.org/case/robinson-v-wentzell/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-43" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">44

SEPARATION OF POWERS

Sackett v. Environmental Protection Agency: On behalf of their client, PLF attorneys won a unanimous decision at the U.S. Supreme Court in 2012 that expanded access to federal courts for landowners seeking to challenge the wetlands jurisdiction of the Environmental Protection Agency. In March 2020, the EPA rescinded a compliance order against the PLF client that had been part of the basis for the initial litigation. https://pacificlegal.org/case/sackett-v-environmental-protection-agency/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-44" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">45 (This case is discussed in further detail under the “Supreme Court Victories” section).

U.S. Army Corps of Engineers v. Hawkes: On behalf of their client, PLF attorneys won a unanimous decision at the U.S. Supreme Court in 2018 that expanded access to federal courts for landowners seeking to sue federal regulatory agencies. Because of this victory, PLF’s client was able to subsequently win a lawsuit lower federal court that overturned a regulatory determination made by the Army Corps. https://pacificlegal.org/case/u-s-army-corps-of-engineers-v-hawkes/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-45" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">46 (This case is discussed in further detail under the “Supreme Court Victories” section).

Supreme Court Victories

Through May of 2021, fourteen cases decided by the U.S. Supreme Court had involved clients directly represented by Pacific Legal Foundation attorneys. PLF won 12 of the cases. https://pacificlegal.org/plf-at-the-supreme-court/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-46" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">47

KNICK V. TOWNSHIP OF SCOTT, PENNSYLVANIA (2019)

Knickreversed the Supreme Court’s 1985 Williamson County decision, which had prevented property owners from direct access to a federal court when claiming a takings violation under the U.S. Constitution. PLF client Rose Knick, the owner of a Pennsylvania farm containing a suspected graveyard, had been forced by a local government ordinance to open her land to public access. The Williamson Countystandard had prevented Knick from direct access to a federal court to defend her rights under the federal constitution. https://pacificlegal.org/case/knick-v-scott-township-pennsylvania/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-47" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">48

WEYERHAEUSER/MARKLE V. U.S. FISH AND WILDLIFE SERVICE (2018)

Weyerhaeuser/Marklewas a ruling against a decision by federal regulators to designate 1,500 acres in Louisiana as a critical habitat for the dusky gopher frog. Federal regulators claimed the Endangered Species Act gave them the authority to impose the designation, which restricted use of the property and thus diminished its value. PLF client Edward Poitevent owned 95 percent of the property, with the remaining land owned by the Weyerhaeser timber and real estate firm. The facts of the case showed that no dusky gopher frog had been found in the state for more than 50 years. The Supreme Court ruled unanimously that the government had overstepped its legal authority by imposing the critical habitat designation. https://pacificlegal.org/case/markle-v-u-s-fish-and-wildlife-service/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-48" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">49

MINNESOTA VOTERS ALLIANCE V. MANSKY(2018)

Minnesota Voters Alliancewas a free speech case involving PLF client Andy Cilek. A Minnesota election law prohibited voters from displaying any recognizable political opinion on their clothing while at a polling place. In 2010, Cilek wore a t-shirt with the motto “Don’t tread on me” to his polling place. He was prevented from voting for several hours because of this attire, and a poll worker threatened him with prosecution. In a 7-2 ruling the Supreme Court held that the state’s dress code violated Cilek’s First Amendment rights. https://pacificlegal.org/case/minnesota-voters-alliance-v-mansky/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-49" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">50

NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF MANUFACTURERS V. DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE (2018)

In National Association of Manufacturers, the Supreme Court held unanimously that landowners challenging “Waters of the United States” regulations imposed under authority of the Clean Water Act could retain a six-year window to claim harm and sue in federal court. The ruling reversed an Environmental Protection Agency attempt to shrink the window to 120 days. https://pacificlegal.org/case/waters-of-the-united-states/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-50" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">51

PLF’s clients in the case were a diverse collection of private landowners, such as ranchers and farmers. The National Association of Manufacturers, representing its membership in opposition to the EPA rule, had petitioned the Supreme Court to hear the case after conflicting lower court rulings. https://pacificlegal.org/case/waters-of-the-united-states/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-51" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">52

U.S. ARMY CORPS OF ENGINEERS V. HAWKES(2018)

This unanimous decision held that wetlands jurisdictional determinations made by federal agencies should be considered final orders from the perspective of the affected landowner. This allows the landowner to challenge jurisdictional determinations in federal court. Prior rulings had held that jurisdictional determinations were not final orders because a landowner could still obtain the desired use of the land through an expensive permitting process. https://pacificlegal.org/case/u-s-army-corps-of-engineers-v-hawkes/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-52" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">53

ST. JOHNS RIVER WATER MANAGEMENT DISTRICT V. KOONTZ (2013)

SACKETT V. ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY (2012)

RAPANOS V. UNITED STATES (2006)

The Supreme Court ruled that federal regulators at the Environmental Protection Agency and Army Corps of Engineers had been using an over-broad interpretation of a wetland when deciding their jurisdiction under the Clean Water Act. The Supreme Court’s 5-4 ruling requires regulators to prove that a wetland “alone or in combination with similarly situated lands in the region, significantly affects the chemical, physical, and biological integrity” of the waters of the United States. A mere physical connection, however small or temporary, had been the prior standard used by federal regulators to assert their jurisdiction over private land. https://www.goodwinlaw.com/_{/media/Files/Publications/Newsletters/Environmental%20and%20Energy%20Advisory/2006/Supreme_Court_Requires_Significant_Nexus_to_Navigable_Waters_for_Jurisdiction_under_Clean_Water_Ac}.pdf " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-57" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">58

PALAZZOLO V. RHODE ISLAND (2001)

PLF represented Anthony Palazzolo, owner of a Rhode Island auto towing company. Prior to his purchasing property in Rhode Island the state had imposed environmental regulations restricting how the parcel could be developed. The state argued that Palazzolo did not have standing to challenge its regulations under the takings clause of the U.S. Constitution because he acquired title to the property after the regulation had been imposed. https://www.oyez.org/cases/2000/99-2047 " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-58" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">59

SUITUM V. TAHOE REGIONAL PLANNING AGENCY (1997)

In a unanimous decision the Supreme Court held that landowners did not need to attempt a sale of their development rights before seeking to prove in court that a regulation imposed on the land’s development rights had harmed the property’s value and constituted a violation of the takings clause of the U.S. Constitution. https://www.oyez.org/cases/1996/96-243 " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-60" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">61

KELLER V. STATE BAR OF CALIFORNIA (1990)

In a unanimous decision the Supreme Court held that attorney bar associations, as regulatory bodies for the legal profession, were violating the free speech rights of members when they compelled member attorneys to pay dues that were subsequently used for political purposes. https://www.casebriefs.com/blog/law/constitutional-law/constitutional-law-keyed-to-cohen/protection-of-penumbral-first-amendment-rights/keller-v-state-bar-of-california/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-61" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">62

NOLLAN V. CALIFORNIA COASTAL COMMISSION(1987)

Finances

Pacific Legal Foundation’s IRS filings for the year ending June 30, 2020, show nearly $16.6 million total revenue, with nearly $13.8 million from contributions and grants and $2.2 million from investment income. PLF reported total net assets of nearly $60.3 million, which included $54.9 million in investment securities assets. https://pacificlegal.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/2019-2020-irs-form-990.pdf.pdf " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-63" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">64

PLF reported total expenses of $16.5 million for the year ending June 2020. https://pacificlegal.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/2019-2020-irs-form-990.pdf.pdf " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-64" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">65

In describing the sources of its donations, PLF states that individuals contribute 63 percent, foundations another 31 percent, and that 6 percent is contributed by small businesses and other organizations. PLF does not accept voluntary contributions from governments. https://pacificlegal.org/financials/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-65" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">66

FoundationSearch shows PLF’s largest foundation donor for tax year 2018 was $313,865 from the Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund, a donor-advised fund. A donor-advised fund manages charitable accounts through which donors can distribute gifts to charities of their choice while receiving immediate tax benefits. Many of the largest, such as Fidelity, exist to serve the clients of a large investment firm, rather than a particular charitable cause or ideological agenda. Fidelity is the largest such fund in the United States. :{68:(style="box-sizing:border-box;position:relative;vertical-align:baseline;top:-0.5em"):}:

Virgin Islands Subpoena Controversy

In March 2016, U.S. Virgin Islands Attorney General Claude Earl Walker sent a subpoena to ExxonMobil demanding communications between the energy firm and more than 100 organizations, individuals, and universities. The attorney general believed that these communications would show intent by ExxonMobil and some of the named organizations and individuals to mislead the public regarding climate policy and science. The justification for the subpoena was the attorney general’s suspicion that the suspected conduct by Exxon Mobil might have been in civil violation of the U.S. Virgin Islands version of the federal Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO). The federal RICO law was originally created as a criminal and civil law tool to prosecute and defund organized crime bosses and their organizations. https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/may/3/virgin-islands-ag-subpoenas-exxon-communications/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-68" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">69 http://media.washtimes.com.s3.amazonaws.com/media/misc/2016/05/03/U_S__subpoena_file.pdf " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-69" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">70

Pacific Legal Foundation was one of the organizations listed in the subpoena. A Washington Times report revealed that PLF and 68 other “academic institutions and free market think tanks” included in the subpoena were also listed on the “#ExxonSecrets” website hosted by Greenpeace. The newspaper asserted the possibility that the attorney general had directly cribbed from the left-wing climate policy’s website because the subpoena’s listing and the Greenpeace list were “in virtually the same order.” https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/may/3/virgin-islands-ag-subpoenas-exxon-communications/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-70" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">71

Speaking for PLF in a May 2016 report in the Washington Times, vice president of legal affairs James Burling told the newspaper that the attorney general’s subpoena was “unprofessional, irresponsible and reckless” because it used “unverified screed from a Greenpeace site as the basis for his subpoena, putting the listed entities into the cross-hairs of a politically driven investigation.” https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/may/3/virgin-islands-ag-subpoenas-exxon-communications/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-71" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">72

Burling elaborated in a blog post for PLF the next day, saying the subpoena was a “politically motivated fishing expedition of the first order,” as evidenced by the fact that PLF was not involved in climate policy: “We are not scientists and have never taken a position on the global warming debate. In fact, we have never taken a position on whether there is even a debate here.” [emphasis in original]https://pacificlegal.org/plf-a-target-in-the-virgin-island-subpoena/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-72" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">73

ExxonMobil fought the subpoena, which it declared “unreasonably burdensome and intrusive.” The U.S. Virgin Islands’ attorney general withdrew the legal demand in June 2016. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-exxon-mobil-climatechange/u-s-virgin-islands-to-withdraw-subpoena-in-climate-probe-into-exxon-idUSKCN0ZF2ZP " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-73" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">74

Conflict with Sheldon Whitehouse

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) has been a frequent critic of PLF.

“CREEPY FRONT GROUPS” ALLEGATION

In a May 2016 speech on the floor of the U.S. Senate, Whitehouse accused the Pacific Legal Foundation of being one of six “creepy front groups” that had received funding from ExxonMobil in 2014 to promote “anti-scientific climate positions.” As proof for this allegation, Whitehouse quoted from a PLF legal petition in a 2013 case challenging the legal authority of the Environmental Protection Agency to regulate carbon dioxide emissions. In the single sentence quote selected by Whitehouse, the PLF lawyer stated that carbon dioxide was “a ubiquitous natural substance essential to life on Earth.” http://floor.senate.gov/MediaPlayer.php?view_id=2&clip_id=1943 " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-74" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">75 https://pacificlegal.org/ubiquitous-misstatements-in-the-united-states-senate/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-75" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">76

A poster placed behind Whitehouse by a senate aide as he was speaking asserted that ExxonMobil had given $10,000 to PLF. The poster did not allege a quid pro quo between the $10,000 contribution and PLF’s decision to argue that carbon dioxide was a natural substance that makes life possible. The Pacific Legal Foundation’s tax filing for 2014 showed total grants and contributions of $12,965,856 and net assets of $44,565,295. https://pacificlegal.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/2014-IRS-Form-990.pdf " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-76" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">77 http://floor.senate.gov/MediaPlayer.php?view_id=2&clip_id=1943 " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-77" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">78

In a response, Pacific Legal Foundation attorney James Burling noted that the facts about carbon dioxide in the quote selected by Whitehouse were “completely true and not a single scientist on the planet would deny it.” Burling also criticized Whitehouse for ignoring the very next sentence in the petition, which read as follows: “Certain prominent scientific organizations have concluded that atmospheric emissions of carbon dioxide from manmade sources contribute to global climate change.” Burling argued this context was critical because “nowhere in the petition do we raise any doubt about the science of global warming” [emphasis in original] or “even mention that others have cast any doubt on the science.” https://pacificlegal.org/ubiquitous-misstatements-in-the-united-states-senate/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-78" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">79

PALAZZOLO CASE

Prior to becoming a U.S. Senator, Whitehouse was the attorney general of Rhode Island. In 2001 he unsuccessfully represented the state before the Supreme Court in Palazzolo v. Rhode Island. The Pacific Legal Foundation represented Anthony Palazzolo, described by the *New York Times* as a “father of six” and a “former auto wrecker.” Anthony Palazzolo prevailed in a decision that created a higher likelihood of access to the courts for landowners seeking to prove the value of a property has been reduced due to a government regulation. https://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/17/us/a-property-rights-case-tests-wetland-curbs.html " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-79" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">80 https://www.cato.org/blog/takings-clause-has-no-expiration-date-0 " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-80" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">81

Since his election to the Senate, Whitehouse has repeatedly referenced the case and criticized PLF for becoming involved in it. In a September 5, 2018, confirmation hearing for then-Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, Whitehouse referenced the Palazzolodecision when he questioned Kavanaugh about PLF. https://pacificlegal.org/public-interest-litigation-senator-whitehouse-and-the-kavanaugh-hearings/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-81" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">82

Whitehouse began: “You will often see briefs brought by groups like for instance, the Pacific Legal Foundation. Are you familiar with that group?”https://pacificlegal.org/public-interest-litigation-senator-whitehouse-and-the-kavanaugh-hearings/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-82" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">83

“I’ll take your description,” replied Kavanaugh. https://pacificlegal.org/public-interest-litigation-senator-whitehouse-and-the-kavanaugh-hearings/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-83" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">84

Whitehouse continued:https://pacificlegal.org/public-interest-litigation-senator-whitehouse-and-the-kavanaugh-hearings/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-84" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">85

“They get money from right wing conservative and corporate interests and they look for cases around the country that they believe they can use to bring arguments before the Court. I argued against them in the Supreme Court at one point, they came all the way across the country to the shores of Winnapaug Pond, Rhode Island, to hire a client whose case they could take to the Supreme Court with a purpose to make a point… and it causes me to think that sometimes the true party in interest is actually not the named party before the Court but rather the legal group that has hired the client and brought them to the Court more or less as a prop in order to make arguments trying to direct the Court in a particular direction.” https://pacificlegal.org/public-interest-litigation-senator-whitehouse-and-the-kavanaugh-hearings/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-85" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">86

Later that day, the Pacific Legal Foundation lawyer who represented Palazzolo responded in a blog post: “Of course, we didn’t hire Anthony. He hired us (for free) because after nearly forty years of trying to use his property, he understood we were the only hope he had left after he lost at the Rhode Island Supreme Court.” https://pacificlegal.org/public-interest-litigation-senator-whitehouse-and-the-kavanaugh-hearings/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-86" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">87

The PLF lawyer also noted that “most of our donations come from regular people, not large “dark money” corporate donors that the Senator likes to rail against” and that the mission of public interest litigation “is about representing the Anthony Palazzolos of the world against government that has forgotten its mission is to protect the rights of the people.” https://pacificlegal.org/public-interest-litigation-senator-whitehouse-and-the-kavanaugh-hearings/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-87" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">88

Recounting Whitehouse’s history of criticism, Palazzolo’s lawyer asserted that a disdain for public interest litigation was “the real reason why Senator Whitehouse doesn’t like Pacific Legal Foundation.” https://pacificlegal.org/public-interest-litigation-senator-whitehouse-and-the-kavanaugh-hearings/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-88" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">89

Whitehouse resurrected his Palazzolo criticism again in July 2019, following the Supreme Court’s Knick v. Township of Scottdecision, another case in which PLF successfully represented a small landowner. In an essay for The National Law Journal, Whitehouse referenced “the Pacific Legal Foundation, which handpicked the plaintiff in Knick.” The essay did not mention the name of the plaintiff—Rose Knick—and portrayed the decision in her favor as “a massive victory for the partisan donor interests seeking to control our courts.” https://www.whitehouse.senate.gov/news/op-eds/knick-picking-why-a-recent-scotus-ruling-signals-a-new-day " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-89" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">90

At the time of the decision, Rose Knick was a 70-year-old single retiree resisting a local township graveyard ordinance that required her to provide public access to her farm. https://pacificlegal.org/ms-knick-goes-to-washington-again/ " title="" aria-describedby="qtip-90" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; transition: all 0.15s ease 0s;">91

References...

same case as cruz?

an 11 22

...Justice Amy Coney Barrett again decided, late Friday afternoon, to not weigh in on the Biden plan. Barrett "denied an emergency application brought by the Pacific Legal Foundation to block federal student loan forgiveness," CNBC reports.

Unfortunately for those 16 million Americans, a GOP lawsuit, at least temporarily, is causing the forgiveness to be put on hold.

Insider on Thursday reported, "the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals temporarily paused the relief, in response to a lawsuit filed by six Republican-led states who argued the policy would hurt their states' tax revenues, along with those of loan company MOHELA."...

see pow damien schiff:

Money in Politics: On behalf of the Pacific Legal Foundation,Mr. Schiff authored an amicus brief in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission that called for corporations to have the same First Amendment rights as human beings. He wrote that the “distinction between natural and corporate persons” was unjustified and that “[t]he core political speech protections of the First Amendment should be open to all equally.”[[14]](https://civilrights.org/resource/oppose-confirmation-damien-m-schiff-u-s-court-federal-claims/#_ftn14) He also asked the Supreme Court to reverse longstanding precedents that had upheld sensible campaign finance restrictions. In a blog posting about the Citizens United case, Mr. Schiff wrote: “PLF’s brief also makes the larger point that corporations provide significant societal goods, and that their speech (which really is nothing more than the combined speech of the natural persons who form the corporation) should be encouraged, not censored.”[[15]](https://civilrights.org/resource/oppose-confirmation-damien-m-schiff-u-s-court-federal-claims/#_ftn15)

Environmental Rights: Mr. Schiff has expressed contempt for federal environmental laws that protect clean air, clean water, and wildlife. In a February 2017 article entitled “Environmental Law – A Good Place to Start for Trump to Make America Great Again,” he wrote that “the sad reality is that, as a result of environmentalist litigation and agency misrepresentation, these statutes [the Clean Water Act, Clean Air Act, and Endangered Species Act] often are enforced not for the public’s benefit but to stop productive activity that activists or bureaucrats dislike. Such misuse needlessly increases costly regulatory burdens, creating a crippling drag on the economy.”[[16]](https://civilrights.org/resource/oppose-confirmation-damien-m-schiff-u-s-court-federal-claims/#_ftn16) He also proposed an extreme suggestion for Fifth Amendment takings claims, writing: “To make this key right effective, federal agencies should be required to provide compensation when their environmental regulations substantially reduce the value of one’s property.”[[17]](https://civilrights.org/resource/oppose-confirmation-damien-m-schiff-u-s-court-federal-claims/#_ftn17)

In 2011, Mr. Schiff was interviewed by Lou Dobbsabout a case in which he was representing an Idaho family who had sued the Environmental Protection Agency for denying them a permit to build a home because it qualified as a wetland under the Clean Water Act. Mr. Schiff stated: “This is a problem with the agency across the board treating American citizens as if they were not American citizens, as if they were just slaves, and it’s atrocious.”[[18]](https://civilrights.org/resource/oppose-confirmation-damien-m-schiff-u-s-court-federal-claims/#_ftn18)

In 2013, Mr. Schiff lambasted the Endangered Species Act in a Wall Street Journal op-ed, in which he wrote that “the law has endangered the economic health of many communities – while creating a cottage industry of litigation that does more to enrich environmental activist groups than benefit the environment. How did things get so turned around? Blame the bureaucrats of the Endangered Species Act. They have administered the law poorly and flouted provisions designed to promote good science and good sense.”[[19]](https://civilrights.org/resource/oppose-confirmation-damien-m-schiff-u-s-court-federal-claims/#_ftn19) In an article published in April 2017, on Earth Day, Mr. Schiff continued his campaign against the Endangered Species Act, writing: “Unfortunately, the good intentions of that statute – much like those of Earth Day itself – have been perverted to make it, in too many cases, a threat to individual liberty and property rights.” [[20]](https://civilrights.org/resource/oppose-confirmation-damien-m-schiff-u-s-court-federal-claims/#_ftn20)

Property Rights: Mr. Schiff has brought a number of takings cases during his tenure at the Pacific Legal Foundation. For example, he sued San Jose, California for passing an affordable housing ordinance in 2010 that required at least 15 percent of new residential development projects to be sold at affordable prices. Mr. Schiff, on behalf of a building industry association, claimed this law was an unconstitutional taking. The California Supreme Court rejected Mr. Schiff’s argument and unanimously upheld the ordinance.[[21]](https://civilrights.org/resource/oppose-confirmation-damien-m-schiff-u-s-court-federal-claims/#_ftn21)

https://www.npr.org/2021/06/24/1009750949/supreme-court-justices-hand-farmworkers-union-a-loss

sTEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

The Supreme Court has once again tightened the leash on labor unions and their ability to organize workers. The spotlight was on the United Farm Workers and a California law which allowed union organizers to enter farms to speak to workers during non-working hours for a limited number of days each year. Here's NPR legal affairs correspondent Nina Totenberg.

NINA TOTENBERG, BYLINE: By a 6-3 vote along ideological lines, the conservative court majority gutted a California regulation enacted nearly 50 years ago after a campaign by famed union organizer Cesar Chavez. The court said that the law unconstitutionally appropriated private land by allowing union organizers to go on to farm property to drum up union support. The decision, however, stopped short of imposing similar restrictions on the federal labor law, and the court said its decision did not apply to government health and safety inspectors and their access to private property. Federal protections for union access to the worksite were first enacted in the 1930s, but farmworkers were excluded from the law, an exclusion that California sought to make up for nearly a half-century ago.

But after the Supreme Court's decision on Wednesday, California's regulation is, for all practical purposes, gone. Mario Martinez, general counsel for the United Farm Workers Union, contends that in the 1930s, race was the motivating factor in excluding farmworkers from the original federal law protecting union access to the workplace. And now, he says, migrant workers, some of the poorest laborers in the country, are again being left out.

MARIO MARTINEZ: You double down on that exclusion and discrimination by saying that a state law that's been in existence for almost 50 years is not respectful of the growers' rights. But, obviously, there was no discussion of the workers who are essential workers to feed America. There was no discussion of their rights at all.

TOTENBERG: Other union leaders echoed that sentiment. Nicole Berner, general counsel for theService Employees International Union, says if workers learned anything during the pandemic, it was that they needed a union to defend their rights.

NICOLE BERNER: Farmworkers kept working to keep food on all of our tables, and now, because of today's ruling, they'll face even greater obstacles in their efforts to improve their working conditions.

TOTENBERG: Wednesday's decision, written by Chief Justice John Roberts, said that California's regulation amounted to an appropriation of the growers' property, an unconstitutional physical taking of their land without the just compensation required by the Constitution. Joshua Thompson of the Pacific Legal Foundation, which represented the growers, said the court gave them exactly what they asked for.

JOSHUA THOMPSON: When the property rights are infringed by denying farms the right to choose who can come inand cannot come into their property, constitution demands that the government pay for that right.

TOTENBERG: Thompson noted accurately that some of the protections for union organizers' access enacted into the federal law in the 1930s have been eroded by the Supreme Court over time. But Wednesday's decision was only the latest in a series of decisions over the last 16 years that have aimed directly at the heart of organized labor in the United States. The culmination came in 2018, when the court hamstrung public-sector union efforts to collect partial dues from non-union members to cover the costs of collective bargaining. In that decision, the court, by a 5-4 majority, overturned a 40-year-old precedent that had allowed unions to collect limited so-called fair share fees from workers who were not in the union but who benefited from the terms of the contract that the union negotiated.

Wednesday's decision was a potentially mortal blow to the farmworkers in particular. But Mario Martinez, the union's counsel, says there are ways to fight back, from organizing boycotts through social media against particular growers to other measures, including strikes that could make it painful for the growers. UCLA law professor Katherine Stone has written multiple books on labor and employment law.

KATHERINE STONE: Whether it's going to happen within the context of the labor law or whether we're going to have a whole new era of labor warfare is an open question. If you don't have orderly mechanisms to deal with worker organizing and to deal with collective action of workers, then you get disorderly mechanisms.

TOTENBERG: Joining Chief Justice Roberts' opinion yesterday were the court's five other conservatives.Justice Stephen Breyer wrote the dissent for himself and the court's two other liberals.They said that allowing temporary access to an employer's property in non-working hours is not the same thing as a physical taking of property that would require compensation. Nina Totenberg, NPR News, Washington.

2 big losses in ct? high speed rail and

After more than four years, a legal challenge to California's cap-and-trade program has reached an unsuccessful conclusion.

The end came on Wednesday when the California Supreme Court declined to consider an appeal from business groups who consider the program to be an unconstitutional tax.

The program requires companies to buy permits to release greenhouse gases, a system intended to provide a financial incentive to reduce emissions.

The law that provided the program's foundation was not passed with a two-thirds vote in the Legislature, the legal threshold for new taxes, sparking lawsuits from the California Chamber of Commerce and the Pacific Legal Foundation.

A state appeals court rejected their arguments in April, but they appealed. Business groups were also concerned the decision was too broad and could open the door to additional taxes.

Despite the state's victory in court, there are other legal questions around cap and trade. Gov. Jerry Brown is pushing lawmakers to extend the program past 2020 with new legislation.

“With this Supreme Court victory, now it’s up to us to take action extending California’s cap-and-trade system on a more permanent basis," Brown said in a statement.

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Pacific_Legal_Foundation

Tobacco Industry associations

PLF is listed as a "key third party ally" in a September 14, 1999 Philip Morris document.[6]

In 1989, Philip Morris began funding the organization through its Mission Viejo (gated-community land-development company) subsidiary, mainly because the organisation was active in the property rights area and had won cases limiting the States' ability to expropriate or regulate private property. The Mission Viejo subsidiary was interested in fighting a no-growth initiative which had been blocking some of their development projects. At this stage Philip Morris only gave an annual grant of $5,000 each year, just to keep the organisation on side and available, but it may have also funded specific legal projects.

By 1991 the PLF had a major budget crisis. It was in deficit to the tune of about $1 million, which was about a quarter of its $4 million annual requirements. Not long after, Roy Marden, the Philip Morris executive in charge of maintaining relations with the right-wing think tanks and advocacy institutes, joined the PLF board. Overnight the funding increased substantially to $10,000, and then $22,000 by 1993. Philip Morris also began to utilize the PLF to undertake hidden media and political activities on its behalf.

For instance, it enlisted the organization (together with think-tanks like the Reason Foundation, Hoover Institute, Heritage Foundation and Claremont Institute) to write op-ed pieces that were planted in newspapers attacking the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) over its determination that Environmental Tobacco Smoke (ETS) was a carcinogen and its attempt to regulate Indoor Air Quality (IAQ). (See page 4 of this planning document.[7])

At this time Philip Morris was also heavily funded two of PLF's unacknowledged offspring, the National Legal Center for the Public Interest and the Atlantic Legal Foundation. The Washington Legal Foundation was another of a similar kind favoured and funded ($200,000) by Philip Morris, but it was independent of the Scaife-funded, PLF-based network. [8]

The PLF also intervened successful in Keller v. California State Bar, where it established a legal precedent that California lawyers could challenge the use of their dues to the state bar for political purposes. This was an successful attempt to block collective actions by the more liberal Californian lawyers who were involving themselves in such policy areas as class-actions and product liability.

By the mid 1990s the PLF had offices in Sacramento, Anchorage and Seattle and ran several key issues and programs:

Judicial Responsibility Project
College of Public Interest Law
Limited Government Project

It also sloughed off the Center for Applied Jurisprudence which focused on commercial "free speech issues" (i.e., the right to advertise harmful products) and "regulatory reform." Philip Morris was giving them a $25,000 retainer by this time (and presumably paying also for work done on their behalf).

In 1997-1998 the PLF joined forces with the $10 million funded (by Philip Morris) National Smokers Alliance, in a fierce and vindictive legal attack on Professor Stanton Arnold Glantz, a leader of California's main anti-smoking organization, Americans for Nonsmokers Rights [9] and attempted to brand him in the public mind as having something to hide ... a destroyer of legal document (a ruse the tobacco industry used itself on a massive scale). Glantz had received documents from the early tobacco industry whistleblowers, and he had established the first public-access Internet web site revealing how the industry operated.

Anti-Environment Policies

According to ExxonSecrets.org, the Pacific Legal Foundation has received $110,000 from ExxonMobil since 1998. The website goes on to state that:

Anti-environmental from the start, PLF's early actions supported the use of DDT, the use of herbicides in national forests, and the use of public range land without requiring an environmental impact review. They also supported at least six pro-nuclear power cases before the early eighties while accepting funding from Pacific General Electric (PGE), a utility which has gained a great deal through the development of nuclear power in the Pacific Northwest. In the 1980s, PLF won several cases that are considered landmarks by those working on property rights issues today: Nollan v the California Coastal Commission and First Church, both Supreme Court victories which provide precedence for the takings litigation pursued today (Oliver Houck, "With Charity For All," Yale Law Journal, 1993). In October 2003, PLF Vice President M. David Stirling had an Op-Ed published in which he defended President Bush's environmental record and condemned former President Clinton for endorsing the Kyoto Protocol.

Associated Legal Foundations

American Legal Foundation (Founded by Daniel Popeo (of WLF) and run by Michael Carvin) - It says: "we deal exclusively with media issues."
Atlantic Legal Foundation (PM supported) Run by James Richards with strong links to Stephen Whelan (husband of Elizabeth Whelan) and the ACSH - claims to be "committed to redressing the bias against business which manifests itself in favor of narrow "consumer" or "environmental" concerns."
National Legal Center in the Public Interest - Ernest Heuter (It does no litigation work, but is PM supported) It was founded by PLF, and has no members-only a board of directors. It acts as an umbrella and communications hub.
Pacific Legal Center (Sacramento) - Ron Zumbrun - This is the nation's oldest and largest with a 1983 staff of 20 (PM supported)
Southern States Legal Center (New Orleans) founded in 1983 by Elizabeth Williams.
Mountain States Legal Center (founded by the PLF)
Great Plains Legal Foundation (founded by the PLF), and now called Landmark (Kansas City)
Landmark Legal Foundation Run by Mark Levin. Scaife used this organization to fund the anti-Clinton Arkansas Project (He gave them $250,000 - and more than $1 million over a few years).
National Chamber Litigation Center Inc. (Washington) - affiliated with US Chamber of Commerce - run by Stephen Bokat - and says it is "unabashedly pro-business." (PM worked with them and the Business RoundTable)
Capital Legal Foundation (Washington) - run by Dan Burt and funded by Scaife
Washington Legal Foundation - founded by Daniel Popeo (independent of the PLF but supported by both PM and its subsidiary, Kraft Foods)

Contact Details

Pacific Legal Foundation

3900 Lennane Drive, Suite 200

Sacramento, CA 95834

Phone: (916) 419 7111

Fax: (916) 419 7747

Email: plf AT pacificlegal.org

Web: http://www.pacificlegal.org/

Sidley Austin:

In 2011, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in *American Electric Power v. Connecticut*that corporations cannot be sued for greenhouse gas emissions under federal common law, because the Clean Air Act delegates the management of carbon dioxide emissions to the EPA. Peter Keisler, a partner at Sidley Austin, argued on behalf of the petitioners:

• American Electric Power

• Cinergy Company

• Southern Company

• Xcel Energy

Earlier this year, Keisler, along with Roger Martella Jr. also argued on behalf of the Pacific Legal Foundation in a case led by Murray Energy seeking to preemptively throw out the Clean Power Plan. The original plaintiffs before the court were Murray Energy and West Virginia. Peabody Energy, the Utility Air Regulatory Group, Pacific Legal Foundation, National Mining Association, the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity, and 13 additional states joined the plaintiffs’ cause. In June, the federal appeals court in Washington DC dismissed that lawsuit as premature.

[ bs

Chris graduated from the University of Notre Dame, cum laude, with a double major in history and economics in 2010. He then attended Notre Dame Law School, where he graduated magna cum laude and was an Article Editor of the Notre Dame Law Review. Immediately after law school, he was a summer clerk at the Goldwater Institute’s Scharf-Norton Center for Constitutional Litigation. Afterwards, he clerked for the Honorable Thomas D. Schroeder in the United States District Court for the Middle District of North Carolina.]

This LittleSis network map will be updated as polluters fund more attorneys in the fight against the Clean Power Plan. Others with new information are encouraged to build off of this map and connect more companies to the law firms. Not only is it important for people to see these connections, but many will remember that in 2009, Duke Energy was pressured to leave ACCCE after it was caught playing both sides of the Waxman-Markey debate: it publically supported the bill but also was a paying member of ACCCE, which was working to kill the legislation. Duke Energy also quit the National Association of Manufacturers for similar reasons. If utility companies voice support for the Clean Power Plan, it’s crucial to put pressure on them to leave front groups or trade associations working to fight the EPA.

:{Pacific Legal Foundation Background

Ronald Zumbrun and Ramond Momboise, former advisors to California Gov. Ronald Reagan, founded the Pacific Legal Foundation. The founding results from Lewis F. Powell’s secret memo to a friend at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce titled "Attack on the American Free Enterprise System.” Powell wanted the business community to create non-for-profit law firms; thus, thePacific Legal Foundation was created. It’s website says it exists to fight “tyranny” engendered by “overzealous bureaucracies and government red tape” and that it is a foe of “government regulators and environmental extremists.” Powell would go on to become a Supreme Court justice.

Officers

Robin L. Rivett

President and CEO James Burling, Director of Litigation

James S. Burling

Director of Litigation John Groen

John M. Groen

General Counsel

Principal Attorneys

J. David Breemer, Principal Attorney

J. David Breemer

National Headquarters John Groen

John M. Groen

Northwest Center Brian T. Hodges, Principal Attorney

Brian T. Hodges

Northwest Center M. Reed Hopper, Principal Attorney

M. Reed Hopper

Northwest Center

Meriem Hubbard

Meriem L. Hubbard

National Headquarters Damien Schiff

Damien Schiff

National Headquarters Joshua Thompson

Joshua P. Thompson

National Headquarters Deborah La Fetra

Deborah La Fetra

National Headquarters

National Headquarters Staff Attorneys

Anastasia Boden

Anastasia P. Boden

Staff Attorney Anthony L. François

Anthony L. François

Senior Staff Attorney Ted Hadzi-Antich, PLF Senior Staff Attorney

Ted Hadzi-Antich

Senior Staff Attorney Harold Johnson

Harold E. Johnson

Staff Attorney

Jonathan Wood

Staff Attorney

Regional Offices

Todd Gaziano

Todd F. Gaziano

Executive Director, Senior Fellow in Constitutional Law Mark Miller

Mark Miller

Managing Attorney, Atlantic Center Robert H. Thomas

Robert H. Thomas

Managing Attorney, Hawaii Center Brian T. Hodges, Principal Attorney

Brian T. Hodges

Northwest Center

John Groen

John M. Groen

Northwest Center M. Reed Hopper, Principal Attorney

M. Reed Hopper

Northwest Center Larry G. Salzman, Orange, CA

Larry G. Salzman

Orange, CA Christina M. Martin, Orange, CA

Christina M. Martin

Staff Attorney, Atlantic Center

College of Public Interest Law Attorneys

Ethan Blevins

Ethan W. Blevins

Northwest Center

Wen Fa

National Headquarters Christopher Kieser

Christopher M. Kieser

National Headquarters Caleb Trotter

Caleb R. Trotter

National Headquarters

Raymond Nhan, National Headquarters

Raymond J. Nhan

National Headquarters Julio Colomba, National Headquarters

Julio N. Colomba

National Headquarters

Philanthropy Team

Robert Dean

Robert D. Dean

Chief Development Officer

National Headquarters Robert D. Dean, Development Officer

Richard G. Fields

Development Officer

National Headquarters James G. Katzinski, Regional Director of Development

James G. Katzinski

Regional Director of Development

Northwest Center

Director of Planned Giving Douglas R. Kruse, Regional Director of Development, Atlantic Center

Douglas R. Kruse

Regional Dir. of Dev.

Atlantic Center

Bob L. Vice, Senior Advisor to the Board of Trustees

Bob L. Vice

Senior Advisor to

Board of Trustees Mike W. Wells, Counselor to the President

Mike W. Wells

Counselor to the President

National Headquarters

Communications Team

Robert Krauter

Robert L. Krauter

Chief Communications

Officer Harold Johnson

Harold E. Johnson

Director of Communications Linda Hellekson, Office & Administrative Support Manager

Kevin M. Desormeaux

Digital Content Manager Brian Feulner Creative Director

Brian Feulner

Creative Director

Ashley D. Indrieri,Public Outreach Coordinator and Grant Writer

Ashley D. Indrieri

Public Outreach Coordinator,

Grant Writer Kate Pomeroy, Media Officer and Research Associate

Kate A. Pomeroy

Media Director

DC Center Patty Lee, Communications Support

Patty Lee

Communications Support

kqed 2x? forum

Damien Schiff FEDSOC

Environment and Land-Use, Principal Attorney at Pacific Legal Foundation

Sacramento, California Area

Law Practice

Current

Pacific Legal Foundation

Alston & Bird LLP, Pacific Legal Foundation, United States Court of Federal Claims

Education

University of San Diego School of Law

Websites

Professional Bio

Company Website

233

connections

Summary

I am a principal attorney at Pacific Legal Foundation, the nation’s leading public interest organization committed to litigating pro bono for property rights. I have a decade of experience litigating cases concerning a variety of federal and state environmental and land-use issues, includingSackett v. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, a groundbreaking decision in which the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the right of landowners to challenge Clean Water Act compliance orders issued by the Environmental Protection Agency. In addition to the Clean Water Act, my practice has included direct litigation and friend-of-the-court briefs arising under the federal and California Endangered Species Acts, among other laws.

Experience

Principal Attorney

Pacific Legal Foundation

October 2015 – Present (5 months)

Alston & Bird LLP

Counsel

Alston & Bird LLP

January 2015 – October 2015 (10 months)

land-use and environmental litigation

Principal Attorney

Pacific Legal Foundation

September 2005 – December 2014 (9 years 4 months)

I litigated a variety of environmental and land-use cases in state and federal courts throughout the country. I also appeared regularly in news media, trade publications, and law reviews to advocate for protection of private property rights.

Law Clerk to Hon. Victor J. Wolski

United States Court of Federal Claims

2004 – 2005 (1 year)Washington D.C. Metro Area

I researched and drafted memos to assist the judge in deciding cases seeking compensation from the federal government, for takings and breach of contract, among other issues.

Publications

BNA Insights: Interpreting "Water of the United States," An Analysis of the New Clean Water Act Regulations

Bloomberg BNA: Water Law & Policy Monitor

August 2015

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the Environmental Protection Agency have issued new regulations under the Clean Water Act that make several important changes to how the agencies will assert jurisdiction over wetlands and other waters not currently covered under the act. We drill down into the rule to explain how the agencies have sought to define which waters and wetlands

would be subject to Clean Water Act requirements and the areas where things remain the same.

Authors:

Damien Schiff, Paul Beard II

Underground Regulation

The Water Report

March 2015

In California Association for Recreational Fishing v. Department of Fish & Wildlife, the California Court of Appeal issued a ground-breaking decision applying the underground regulation doctrine to proposed mitigation measures contained within an environmental impact report.

Authors:

Damien Schiff

The Endangered Species Act at 40: A Story of Radicalization, Politicization, Bureaucratization, and Senescence

Environs

April 2014

After 40 years of controversy, the Endangered Species Act needs an overhaul. This article offers a few thoughts as to how such a revamping should proceed.

Authors:

Damien Schiff

Education

University of San Diego School of Law

J.D., Magna Cum Laude

2001 – 2004

Activities and Societies: Order of the Coif, San Diego Law Review

Georgetown University

B.A., History, Magna Cum Laude

1997 – 2000

Activities and Societies: Phi Beta Kappa

Skills

Environmental LawLand Use Law

Honors & Awards

Attorney of the Year - Appellate Law

California Lawyer Magazine

June 2013

For my work as lead counsel in Sackett v. EPA

LO scrape:

Aaron Gettis

Deputy County Counsel at County of Riverside

Michael Profant, Esq., AICP

Land Use Attorney

Braiden Chadwick

Partner at Mitchell Chadwick LLP

Hans Feige

Owner, Feige & Associates, Inc.

Christopher Butcher

Experienced Land Use & Environmental Attorney

Hans Meyer

Assistant Professor at Ohio University

Michael Ng

Attorney at California Coastal Commission

John Wheat

Land Use and Natural Resources Attorney at Mitchell Chadwick LLP

Tim Taylor

Environmental and Land Use Attorney

Paul Beard II

Counsel at Alston & Bird

pest control trans bay terminal

jb star trek clarmont

timothy Sandefur is a principal attorney at the Pacific Legal Foundation, and heads the Foundation’s Economic Liberty Project, which protects entrepreneurs against intrusive government regulation. He has won important legal victories for economic freedom in California, Oregon, Missouri, Kentucky, and other states, and represented the plaintiffs in Merrifield v. Lockyer, a major economic liberty decision in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. In late 2011, he was named “Appellate Lawyer of The Week” for his work challenging the constitutionality of the Patient Protection And Affordable Care Act. He is the author of three books, Cornerstone of Liberty: Property Rights in 21st Century America (2006), The Right to Earn A Living: Economic Freedom And The Law(2010), and The Conscience of The Constitution (2014), as well as some 50 scholarly articles on subjects ranging from eminent domain and economic liberty to copyright, evolution and creationism, slavery and the Civil War, and legal issues in Shakespeare and ancient Greek drama. His articles have appeared in The Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy, The NYU Journal of Law & Liberty, National Review, The Claremont Review of Books, The San Francisco Chronicle, The Washington Times, and other places. He is an adjunct scholar with the Cato Institute and a frequent guest on radio and television programs, including John Stossel, The Armstrong and Getty Show, and the Jim Lehrer News Hour. He is a graduate of Chapman University School of Law and Hillsdale College.

{ 1973: California Chamber of Commerce created the Pacific Legal Foundation "to practice law on behalf of business interests [by the filing of] lawsuits to block environmental actions and thwart regulations." Coors used this as his model for the Mountain States Legal Foundation in 1976.

Tony Francois of the Pacific Legal Foundation,

Senior Staff Attorney

Pacific Legal Foundation

December 2012 – Present (2 years 8 months)Sacramento, California

Public-interest litigation in defense of property and water rights, and in favor of balanced implementation of environmental protection that respects property rights and economic liberty.

Principal

Sacramento Strategic Resources

February 2012 – November 2012 (10 months)Sacramento, California

California government relations firm providing legislative and regulatory tracking; research, policy analysis and materials development; policy development and goal setting; government relations strategy development; and legislative and regulatory advocacy services.

Lobbyist

KP Public Affairs

April 2007 – January 2012 (4 years 10 months)Sacramento, California Area

Registered Lobbyist, responsible for developing and implementing legislative, regulatory, and compliance strategies, including integration of litigation, public relations, and grass roots strategies, for trade associations, water agencies, and corporate clients, in water quality, water rights, groundwater, and water conservation, oil spill prevention, CEQA, greenhouse gas regulation and AB 32 implementation, regulatory fees and implementation of Proposition 26, air quality, and fuels and energy policy.

Director, Water Resources

California Farm Bureau Federation

2003 – 2007 (4 years)Sacramento, California Area

Registered Lobbyist, responsible for state and local government relations related to water supply, water rights, flood control, and water quality, before the state legislature, Governor’s Office, Department of Water Resources, Department of Fish and Game, State Water Resources Control Board, all Regional Water Quality Control Boards, and numerous counties. Advised Farm Bureau board of directors, staff, and members on compliance with water rights, flood control, and water quality laws. Closely involved in Russian River water rights regulation by the State Water Resources Control Board.

Associate Attorney

McQuaid Bedford & Van Zandt LLP

1999 – 2003 (4 years)

Associate Attorney

Law Clerk

Keck Mahin & Cate

1995 – 1996 (1 year)

Law Clerk for national firm's water and property law practice.

Law Clerk

Taggart & Hawkins

1994 – 1995 (1 year)

Law Clerk

Infantry Lieutenant

United States Army

1987 – 1992 (5 years)

bs: He is a graduate of the U.S. Army Ranger School.

Upon leaving the military, Mr. François attended law school at the University of California Hastings College of the Law in San Francisco, where he earned the American Jurisprudence Award for Pre-Trial Civil Practice, and from which he graduated cum laude with a J.D. in 1996.

He went on to private practice in water and environmental law, assisting in the litigation of numerous water right claims before the Nevada State Engineer and in the Snake River Basin Adjudication, including the adjudication of Wayne Hage’s Pine Creek water rights, as well as the defense of private water rights in the long running series of litigation against the Truckee-Carson Irrigation District brought by the federal government.

In 2003, Mr. François joined the California Farm Bureau Federation as their California government affairs representative on all water issues, and in 2007 he joined KP Public Affairs, California’s largest contract lobbying firm, where his government relations practice included water policy, greenhouse gas regulation and energy policy, and environmental regulation.

Mr. François joined Pacific Legal Foundation’s National Litigation Center in 2012. He and his family reside in Sacramento.

bs pr:

PLF Client Highlight

"A 20 year battle is over, thanks to Pacific Legal Foundation. My father would be proud. Thank you PLF for your support."

Coy Jr. and Linda Koontz

Max Stevenson of the Yolo County Flood Control and Water Conservation District, who has been working on groundwater monitoring;

* Tony Francois of the Pacific Legal Foundation, who will talk about laws relating to groundwater;

* Jack Rice of the California Farm Bureau, who keeps up on legislation in Sacramento; and

* David Guy of the Northern California Water Association, who will discuss the results of the Proposition 1 water bond on the Nov. 4 ballot.

An appeal to the High Court is due to be filed soon by the Lunny family, owners of the 80-year-old oyster farm, after a 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals panel ruled against them in their fight for survival against the U.S. Interior Department.

The U.S. Supreme Court has an opportunity to do right by the environment, the economy, and the rule of law, by agreeing to review the federal government’s controversial decision to shut down Drakes Bay Oyster Co. in the Point Reyes National Seashore north of San Francisco.

Residents of Northern California and beyond know the oyster farm as a regional treasure. Forty percent of oysters harvested in California come from Drakes Bay. Of its 30 longtime employees, a number live at the site with their families. Drakes Bay’s farm is a major recreational and educational resource, drawing tens of thousands of visitors each year to learn about sustainable marine agriculture and sample rich nutritious marine products. The farm’s operations have been praised over the years for an ethic of environmental sensitivity and harmony.

But it’s not just the future of this Bay Area institution that’s on the line. The Lunnys’ lawsuit asks fundamental questions about accountability in government, especially in the area of environmental policy. Shouldunelected regulators be permitted to operate in a vacuum, essentially as a law unto themselves, so their decisions are shielded from meaningful review by the courts, even when environmental quality could be compromised?

One of the most important federal environmental statutes — the National Environmental Policy Act, or NEPA — is designed to foster accountability. When a federal action would affect the environment, NEPA says the impacts must be carefully studied and reported to the public.

But the National Park Service did not comply with NEPA when it decided against extending the decades-old lease that has allowed the oyster farm to serve as one of the country’s primary providers of this sustainable and healthy food source.

Yes, the feds did produce a partial, deceptive, and self-serving report. It was so sloppy that no self-respecting environmentalist would let it stand in any other context. Sen. Dianne Feinstein slammed it as “flawed ... with false and misleading science.”

Now, regulators are claiming they didn’t have to do any analysis at all, let alone a comprehensive NEPA review, because they weren’t okaying a new land-use project, merely bringing an end to an existing one.

Surely that’s a distinction without a difference, because the environment can potentially be affected as much by closing down a facility or project as by starting one up. Still, the 9th Circuit panel — or at least the majority in the 2-1 decision — bought the government’s hair-splitting interpretation of NEPA. It reasoned that regulators can excuse themselves from providing a NEPA analysis or reporting to the public, merely by asserting that their decision to alter an existing land use is “good for the environment.”

The government’s stance in this dispute is sadly ironic. Drakes Bay oyster farm is integral to the agricultural heritage on which the National Seashore is founded, and for decades the feds partnered in preserving that heritage. Now, they’re furiously cutting corners as they abandon it.

Environmental organizations are also raising eyebrows by taking the government’s side. Friends of the environment don’t usually endorse government avoidance of environmental laws — especially “sunshine” mandates for openness.

A robust NEPA study would allow regulators and the public to know the full consequences of closing the oyster farm. For one thing, the underwater racks on which oysters are grown would have to be removed, requiring a barge-mounted generator and electric hoist that could disturb the sea bed and shoreline. Water quality could also permanently suffer from the loss of the shellfish that filter nitrogen and phosphorus from the estuary.

So now it’s up to the Supreme Court to decide whether NEPA will be enforced in a rigorous way. In supporting the Lunnys’ request that the court take the case, the property-rights-oriented Pacific Legal Foundation will argue in an amicus brief that agencies can’t exempt themselves from environmental review on their own say-so.

Transparency and honesty. That’s all that NEPA asks of bureaucrats, if correctly interpreted and applied. On matters such as the oyster farm’s future, the public deserves to know all the facts and implications, in the full light of day.

Tony Francois is an attorney with the Pacific Legal Foundation.

----

Pacific Legal Foundation Challenges San Jose’s New-Housing Penalty – By Tony Francois, Senior Staff Attorney

Posted on 01. Jun, 2015 by AOA of California, INC. in all

Facebook Twitter Email Linkedin Digg

SACRAMENTO, CA: On, April 8th, the California Supreme Court heard an oral argument from Pacific Legal Foundation (PLF) in a challenge to San Jose’s “Inclusionary Housing Ordinance,” which imposes a significant financial penalty on the providers – and purchasers – of new homes.

Donor-supported PLF is the leading watchdog organization that litigates for limited government and property rights nationwide. In challenging the San Jose ordinance, PLF represents the California Building Industry Association – free of charge, as with all PLF clients.

PLF Senior Staff Attorney Tony Francois argued the case before the California Supreme Court.

The ordinance requires builders of developments with 20 homes or more to set aside 15 percent of the new units at below-market prices. As an alternative, a builder would have to pay an “in lieu” fee of $122,000 for each of the below-market units that would otherwise have to be supplied.

Although the plan is billed as an “affordable housing” program, it promises to raise costs on new housing and deter development. The legal challenge argues that the ordinance violates constitutional property rights because it imposes a financial penalty on builders with no showing that their new home construction creates a need for new affordable housing.

In essence, the program transfers the cost of “affordable” units from the public generally to homebuilders (and to the buyers of new, market-priced homes).

“Under basic constitutional principles, government may not single out specific individuals or groups of property owners to bear the burden of paying for needs they didn’t create, and for general social programs that are the responsibility of the entire community,” said Francois. “Politicians are not permitted to extort property owners by demanding property that is unrelated to the permits they are seeking.”

The case is California Building Industry Association v. City of San Jose. More information, including PLF’s briefs, a podcast, and a video statement, may be found at: www.pacificlegal.org

===

Artists angered as developers challenge Oakland's public art requirement

By Mike Blaskymblasky@bayareanewsgroup.com

POSTED: 07/24/2015 10:00:29 AM PDT0 COMMENTS| UPDATED: ABOUT 15 HOURS AGO

OAKLAND -- Many Bay Area cities have required developers to put a small percentage of their project costs toward public art projects for years, and Oakland officials were happy to join those ranks when city officials approved their own art requirement in December.

But city officials were surprised this week when a group representing regional builders sued Oakland over their new 1 percent requirement, claiming the requirement violated developers' First Amendment rights by forcing them to pay for someone else's speech -- in this case, someone else's art.

"The Ordinance requires the Association's members to install only those forms of public art approved by the City in violation of the right of the Association's members to refrain from conveying government mandated messages," wrote lawyers in the suit, filed in U.S. District Court.

But cities like San Francisco, Emeryville and Napa have never been sued for their similar art ordinances. So, why Oakland, and why now?

The city's numerous artists have an opinion.

"It's arrogance from developers," said Eric Arnold, a spokesman for the Community Rejuvenation Project, a nonprofit group specializing in community murals. "It's not asking too much of those who are building in Oakland, basically changing the nature of the city, to support art that will keep Oakland cool."

The BIA's lawyers say they picked Oakland because the ordinance is timely and new, having been approved in December and implemented in February.

But builders are really trying to keep costs down in Oakland's booming real estate market, according to development lobbyists.

The costs for building in San Francisco and Oakland are about the same, said business advocate Greg McConnell, president of the Jobs and Housing Coalition. But the revenue generated by the San Francisco building is nearly double.

"The projects won't pencil out (in Oakland) because the revenue isn't sufficient," McConnell said.

The BIA also claimed in the suit that art fees amounted to an unfair exaction, because there's no evidence new development has a negative impact on public art.

McConnell agreed. From a developer's point of view, he said, the fee is really a tax.

"There has to be a nexus between eliminating some problem that development incurs and the fund you're trying to create," he said. "The simple question is, what is the relationship? How does new residential or commercial development adversely affect public art?"

Mayor Libby Schaaf, who championed the art ordinance while still a council member, said the ordinance doesn't prohibit developers from picking the artist of their choice.

It was based almost exactly on Emeryville's ordinance, she said, which is one of the least restrictive and pro-developer art ordinances in the region.

"There's no review of content, none at all, because it's private money," Schaaf said. "It's designed to hold large-scale developers to a certain aesthetic standard, which is very much in the city's purview and interest."

The city's attorneys are evaluating the lawsuit, she said.

Cities across the region are requiring more development impact fees from builders as officials struggle to build more housing and keep rents in check.

Oakland is considering -- but hasn't adopted -- affordable housing fee requirements because officials are worried higher fees would scare off developers.[sj has, tf foights]

McConnell said Oakland is clearly moving toward more development fees, however. Those percentages might seem small, he said, but they compound.

"It just all adds up, and that hurts developers," he said.

The BIA's lawyer, Tony Francois of the Pacific Legal Foundation, said adding new fees for developers is simply the wrong approach. Only more housing will solve the housing crisis, he said.

"This is a backwards policy response to Oakland's need to facilitate increasing housing production," Francois said. "They need to be making it easier to build instead of adding costs."

Making life easier for builders is the BIA's job. The statewide California Builders Association was behind the lawsuit challenging San Jose's 2010 ordinance requiring developers set aside 15 percent of its building units for affordable housing.

"It's not like they pick on Oakland," McConnell said. "They pick on what they consider to be anti-development practices."

Arnold said he thought the lawsuit was ridiculous and insulting. Developers in Oakland have a choice between paying for their own art or contributing to the overall art fund. That doesn't harm their right to free speech, he said.

"It's a ridiculous stretch of the First Amendment," Arnold said.

And the lawsuit comes as public art is being celebrated in other cities. San Francisco plans to add $50 million in public art on Treasure Island in the next several years, in part funded by their 1 percent art requirement, he said.

Arnold said Oakland officials are already bending over backward to support developers, but they just want a bigger piece of the pie.

"These developers are acting like this is highway robbery," he said.

There are more artists in Oakland per capita than anywhere else in the world, according to the city. Arnold said developers should remember they're working in that community.

Many artists make their living with public art projects, which have decreased since the state ended redevelopment funding in 2012.

"Public art is how cities become art cities," Arnold said. "You don't become a world-class city without world-class art."

Mike Blasky covers Oakland City Hall. Contact him at 510-208-6429. Follow him at Twitter.com/blasky.

This morning I joined KQED’s Forumto talk about the *Friedrichs v. CTA*case which the Supreme Court will hear next term. The case involves the question of whether the government may force public employees to subsidize unions against their will. You can listen online here.

Later on, I talked with Thom Hartmann about the case. You can listen here, but you have to pay. (Apparently Mythical Intelligence, Inc., isn’t an Evil Greedy Corporation.TM)

Supreme Court to hear teachers’ union politicking case

The Supreme Court announced this week that it will hear Friedrichs v. California Teachers Association, a case filed by the Center for Individual Rights. Presently, all public school teachers must contribute their “fair share” to a teachers’ union in California to cover the costs of collective bargaining. And if a teacher doesn’t want to also support the union’s political activities, the teacher must go through an arcane and time-limited “opt-out” procedure. Recently, the some members of the Court questioned this practice in two cases — *Knox v. Service Employees International Union* and *Harris v. Quinn*. A couple of years ago we filed our amicus brief in Knox suggesting that such “opt-out” procedures reversed the constitutional order of things: teachers may be allowed affirmatively “opt-in” to support a union’s politicking, rather than be forced to go through a burdensome procedure to “opt-out.” Several of the justices agreed this was an important issue, but deferred resolution to another day. With the grant in Friedrichs, that day is here. We filedthis briefasking the Court to take review and we’ll be filing another brief on the merits. Under the First Amendment, no one should be forced through procedural machinations a cause in which he does not believe. As Thomas Jefferson put it, “That to compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves and abhors, is sinful and tyrannical.”

http://www.pacificlegal.org/staff/Timothy-Sandefur

Timothy Sandefur, principal attorney, Pacific Legal Foundation;

co-author of PLF's amicus brief for Freidrichs v. California Teachers Association

Principal Attorney

PLF National Headquarters

(916) 419-7111

Practice areas

Economic Liberty

Eminent Domain

Background

Timothy Sandefur is a Principal Attorney at the Pacific Legal Foundation. As the lead attorney in the Foundation's Economic Liberty Project, he works to protect businesses against abusive government regulation, and has won important victories for free enterprise in California, Oregon, Missouri, and other states.

Publications / Achievements

He is the author of three books, Cornerstone of Liberty: Property Rights in 21st Century America (2006), The Right to Earn A Living: Economic Freedom And The Law (2010), and The Conscience of The Constitution: The Declaration of Independence And The Right to Liberty (2013), as well as some 45 scholarly articles on subjects ranging from eminent domain and economic liberty to copyright, evolution and creationism, slavery and the Civil War, and legal issues in Shakespeare and ancient Greek drama. His articles have appeared in National Review, The Claremont Review of Books, The San Francisco Chronicle, The Washington Times, and Regulation, among other places. He is an adjunct scholar with the Cato Institute and a frequent guest on radio and television programs, including John Stossel, The Armstrong and Getty Show, the Jim Lehrer News Hour, and NPR's This American Life.

Education

Sandefur is a graduate of Chapman University School of Law and Hillsdale College.

===

What if we, the people, were to ask federal administrative agencies to respond in a timely manner to requests made under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA)? The current denizens of the federal government tell us they will respond only if and when sued. Otherwise, we, the people, can pound salt.

That’s what happened in our challenge to the National Forest Service’s decision to padlock Plumas National Forest, Granat v. USDA. Our clients asked for background information regarding the Forest Service’s action closing thousands of roads and trails to motorized travel, making Plumas National Forest accessible only to the most able-bodied among us. The lawsuit addresses a number of important legal violations by the government, including the Forest Service’s failure to respond to FOIA requests.

As soon as we filed the Complaint, the Forest Service provided the information that it had withheld for almost five years. At the same time, the Forest Service filed a Motion to Dismiss the FOIA claims, on the ground that, because the information was provided after we sued, the FOIA claims were “moot,” and the court could not provide any relief.

Not so fast. We filed an opposition to the motion, arguing that Forest Service employees must respond to FOIA requests in a timely manner and not wait until they are sued to comply with the law. What’s the point of having a law that guarantees citizens the right to information regarding how their government operates if government employees can violate it with impunity, as long as they comply after being sued? The most charitable view is that the government is encouraging litigation. A less charitable view is that the arrogance of federal employees is eviscerating the FOIA.

Our modest proposal is this. The federal government should comply with the FOIA in a timely manner, before it is sued. The current Administration, which promised to be the most transparent, has turned out to be among the least transparent, thereby turning the FOIA on its head.

Environmental Regulations, General, Individual Rights, No to Big Government, Uncategorized foia, government abuse, Pacific Legal Foundation, Ted Hadzi-Antich, United States Forest Service

speakers bureau:

Topics

Coastal Property Rights
Constitutional Law and History
Economic Liberty
Eminent Domain
Environmental Regulation (Endangered Species Act and Clean Water Act)
Equal Protection (Equal Rights)
Health Care
Growth Management/Land Use
Land Use Regulation
Mission and Strategy of Pacific Legal Foundation
Property Rights
Public Interest Law
Water Rights

===

Vol. 18 No. 7 (July, 2008) pp.632-636

THE RISE OF THE CONSERVATIVE LEGAL MOVEMENT: THE BATTLE FOR CONTROL OF THE LAW, by Steven M. Teles. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2008. 385pp. Cloth. $35.00/£19.95. ISBN: 9780691122083.

Reviewed by Roy B. Flemming, Department of Political Science, Texas A&M University. Email: roy [at] politics.tamu.edu.

Sure, it was a coincidence but the timing could not have been better. The morning before I sat down to write this review, I received a solicitation letter from the Federalist Society asking me for a donation. The letter signed by Eugene B. Meyer, the organization’s president, pointedly quoted Steven Teles’ comment from his book that the “Federalist Society represents, without a doubt, the most vigorous, durable, and well-ordered organization to emerge from . . . modern conservatism’s political strategy.”

When Teles set out to document the stumbles, turning points, and successes of the conservative counter-mobilization against legal liberalism, his “first real breakthrough” came after Meyer let him loose to rummage through the Society’s internal documents. Other entrepreneurs in the conservative legal movement like Henry Manne, William “Chip” Mellor, and Clint Bolick fully cooperated with Teles, answering his questions and providing him with background documents. Equally important, pivotal financial patrons of the movement, like the Olin Foundation, followed suit. Finally, Teles decided to organize his research around the themes of strategy and entrepreneurship which he credits to conversations with Stuart Butler of the Heritage Foundation. No published study about the conservative legal movement of which I am aware can compete with the information, detail, perspectives, and stories that Teles has packed into his book.

Teles’ major stories pivot around the formation and evolution of the Federalist Society, the emergence and institutionalization of law and economics as part of law school curriculums, the Center for Individual Rights, and the Institute for Justice. Nested within these narratives are vignettes of other players and organizations that illustrate how patrons and entrepreneurs learned from their mistakes and redirected their strategies. Teles quickly alerts his readers that he not concerned with organizations like the American Center for Law and Justice that have been involved in religious or social conservative litigation. Nor is he interested in the thicket of conservative think tanks that sprouted up during the past three decades or in the proliferation of litigating groups with traditional pro-business agendas or interests in tort reform. The price of Teles’ tight focus, however, is easily off-set by the many benefits generated by his in-depth discussions.

The idea for a conservative legal counter-mobilization first surfaced in Lewis Powell’s confidential memorandum to the US Chamber of Commerce in 1971 shortly before Nixon nominated him to the Supreme Court. (Powell’s memo can be found at [*633] www.pbs.org/wnet/supremecourt/personality/print/sources_document13.html). Entitled “Attack of [sic] the American Free Enterprise System,” Powell argued America’s economic system was under “broad attack.” The “most disquieting” attacks were not those made by the usual left-wing or socialist suspects but those from “the college campus, the pulpit, the media, the intellectual and literary journals, the arts and sciences, and from politicians.” Powell urged the Chamber to confront the criticism especially in universities and colleges (including a “balancing of faculties”) and redirect the public agenda by creating incentives for “independent scholars who believe in the system” to publish more often and more widely. In a very real sense, Powell’s ideas foreshadowed Manne’s campaign to create law and economics centers in law schools and the Olin Foundation’s initiatives aimed at the elite schools as well as the network of conservative faculty and students created by the Federalist Society.

In a section called a “Neglected Opportunity in the Courts,” Powell cautioned that liberal and far left groups had been “far more astute” in recognizing the “judiciary may be the most important instrument for social, economic, and political change.” This could be a “vast area of opportunity” for the Chamber and the soon-to-be associate justice recommended that it hire “highly competent” staff attorneys to file amicus briefs in the Supreme Court or under special circumstances retain “lawyers of national standing and reputation” to participate in Chamber-sponsored law suits. The American Civil Liberties Union, civil rights groups, and liberal public interest law outfits like those created by Ralph Nader, offered off-the-shelf templates that conservatives could use to organize their counter-mobilization. As Teles explains, Powell implied that the fundamental problem was an imbalance in the interests appearing in courtrooms and that it could be righted by recruiting pro-business if not conservative “repeat players” and by a revival of “judicial restraint” on the bench.

Things did not play out as simply as Powell intimated. Following the formation of the Pacific Legal Foundation in 1973 with the support from the California Chamber of Commerce, several other regional foundations were soon created under the auspices of the National Legal Center for the Public Interest (NLCPI).This network was organized geographically, not functionally, and held together by interlocking directorships.The result was “organizational turmoil” because as one insider told Teles “NLCPI had all the structural flaws of the Articles of Confederation” (p.63). Equally telling, the emphasis on filing amicus briefs displaced coherent litigation strategies and put the foundations on fund-raising treadmills. Most damning of all for Powell’s business-led strategy were unexpected tensions between business interests and conservative ideology. As Adam Smith cautioned long ago, business interests are not synonymous with the public interest however it is defined.

Teles’ cameo study of the Mountain States Legal Foundation illustrates the point. With reliable funding from Joseph Coors, a long-time patron of right-wing causes, effective leadership in the early years by James Watts who later became President Reagan’s Interior [*634] Secretary, and a shared sense of grievance arising from the “Sagebrush Rebellion” in the Western states over the control of federal lands, the Mountain States Legal Foundation had several built-in advantages. Nevertheless it faltered because its business allies expected returns on their “investments” and the foundation often filed amicus briefs in response to particular contributions or to encourage new ones. Matters came to a head when the foundation challenged on First Amendment grounds Denver’s grant of an exclusive cable television franchise to a local businessman, a grant widely supported by the Mile High City’s business community. As an insider explained to Teles, the foundation’s suit “gored very powerful interests there, well connected to the Republican Party . . . Joe Coors resigned from our board [saying] . . . ’I founded MSLF . . . to take on the Sierra Club, not to do this sort of thing’” (p.65).

Soul-searching about the strategy behind the first generation of public interest firms began in the late 1970s when Michael Horowitz (subsequently chief counsel of the Office of Management and Budget during the first Reagan administration) submitted a highly critical report to the Scaife Foundation. The Horowitz Report redefined the goals of the legal counter-mobilization. Litigation alone could not dislodge legal liberalism. Ties to business interests tethered conservative public interest firms and held them back from taking the moral high ground. Amicus briefs were “pufferies intended for naïve audiences of donors and not truly doing meaningful work” (p.71). The aversion to basing organizations in Washington, D.C. had to be jettisoned in order to confront liberalism on its own turf. Most important of all, the movement needed to redefine itself along clear, consistent libertarian lines with long-term strategies that would appeal to underdogs caught up in unresponsive legal institutions like black beauticians struggling under state regulations or lower middle class whites whose houses were threatened by eminent domain. Conservatives had to become idealistic “good guys” limiting government and empowering civil society.

The Horowitz Report doused cold water on patron enthusiasm for funding conservative public interest law firms but in time the foundations used the report to restructure how these firms operated Two of these second generation firms are the subject of a separate chapter in which Teles compares the Center for Individual Rights (CIR), best known for its battles against affirmative action policies at the University of Texas and University of Michigan, and the Institute for Justice (IJ) whose fame soared after it turned defeat in KELO v. CITY OF NEW LONDON into a public policy success. While the two firms differ significantly in many ways, they share important similarities. For one thing, judicial activism no longer is a dirty word. Instead both firms see judicial activism as a means of reviving old rights to protect the conservative goal of limited government; property rights and eminent domain offer just one example. Clint Bolick (2007), co-founder of the Institute for Justice, recently argued in favor of judicial activism in a new book published by the libertarian Cato Institute. The firms, seeing the value in an activist bench, are accordingly more strategic in the cases they select and [*635] keep a steady eye on whether a case has the potential to change the public policy agenda or the law.

Horowitz, like Powell, stressed that a “key site” to contest legal liberalism was the university. In three chapters, Teles traces the winding, upward path of the law and economics movement and the seemingly inexorable growth of the Federalist Society. The law and economics story has two parts. The first deals with constructing the “mother ship” at the University of Chicago and the travails of Henry Manne to build law and economic centers at other universities and his final success at George Mason University.

Chicago legitimized law and economics. The JOURNAL OF LAW AND ECONOMICS, the sub-field’s first journal, started there and was later edited by Ronald Coase who won a Nobel Prize for his work. Chicago’s highly influential Anti-Trust Project provided fellowships supported by the Volker Fund, attracted law professors like Robert Bork, and revolutionized the field. Richard Posner with impeccable establishment credentials (Harvard Law and former Supreme Court clerk for Justice William Brennan) wrote ECONOMIC ANALYSIS OF LAW (published in 1973 and now in its seventh edition) in which he challenged myriad shibboleths in traditional legal research. In the meantime, Manne spread the gospel by pushing for new centers at other universities, aggressively marketed law and economics with help from the Liberty Fund by holding regular conferences that identified ambitious scholars and brought them into the conservative fold, and through the Economics Institute for Federal Judges introduced numerous judges to the fundamentals of micro-economics.

The second part of the story focuses on the Olin Foundation’s strategic deployment of its largesse aimed directly at faculty and students in elite law schools (most of Manne’s centers were at lesser-ranked schools) which solidified the stature of the law and economics sub-field and raised its status as a distinctive alternative to traditional and contemporary legal scholarship. Law and economics was not Olin’s first choice, however. As an official explained to Teles: “I would have preferred to do something in constitutional law but . . . [i]f you said to a dean that you wanted to fund conservative constitutional law, he would reject the idea out of hand . . . Law and economics is neutral, but it has a philosophical thrust in the direction of free markets and limited government. That is, like many disciplines, it seems neutral but it isn’t in fact” (p.189). Olin’s gamble on law and economics paid off handsomely in ways that Lewis Powell would have applauded. At Harvard, Olin’s support for law and economics provided money, academic panache, and camouflage for Harvard’s president who wanted to stymie the critical legal studies movement and mollify angry alumni in corporate law firms upset by the havoc they felt the “crits” were creating within the profession. Law and economics raised the research bar for hiring and tenure decisions and offered alternatives to law schools that altered the balance of power in their faculties.

The Federalist Society rang repeated alarms within the legal profession that Harvard Law was “out of control” and [*636] from its beginning the Society has been concerned generally about the placement of conservatives in law schools and out of them. Teles maintains in his chapter on the Society, however, that over the course of its twenty-five year history the Federalist Society has carved out an influential niche for itself by limiting its attention to creating and fostering complex networks of lawyers, faculty, law students, and foundation patrons that are held together by an emphasis on serious debate and discourse over ideas that challenge legal liberalism while avoiding right-wing factionalism. Eschewing the establishment of an in-house litigation center early on, the Society also decided not turn itself into a conservative clone of the American Bar Association despite earlier feelings that perhaps it should and despite its persistent criticisms of the ABA. These strategic choices (there were others at critical moments) were made by a stable, self-perpetuating cadre of long-serving leaders, including Eugene Meyer, who were present at the Society’s founding and are aligned with foundation executives and senior figures from the legal community.

Teles neither constructs a theory of the rise of the conservative legal movement nor tests one. Conceptual references are employed at various times but largely to locate the study within the existing literature. This by no means diminishes Teles’ accomplishment. Each of his multiple interlocking stories of the pas de trois between different conservative entrepreneurs, their patrons and financiers, and the institutions they either created or tried to change took place over several years and demanded clear precise detailing, which they duly received. Teles’ book is an important reference and the chief departure point for anybody seriously wanting to understand one of the most important transformations in contemporary legal history and politics.

REFERENCES:

Bolick, Clint. 2007. DAVID’S HAMMER: THE CASE FOR AN ACTIVIST JUDICIARY. Washington, D.C.: Cato Institute.

Posner, Richard. 1973. ECONOMICS OF LAW. Boston: Little Brown and Company.

CASE REFERENCE:

KELO v. CITY OF NEW LONDON, 545 U.S. 469 (2005)

*********************

2008 by the author, Roy B. Flemming

===

loe 7/12/14 lift end sp on mantees!

kqed damien schiff sues ABAG to stop transit b/c crimps lifestyle using env law thus evil

http://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/news/2013/08/06/legal-group-sues-to-stop-plan-bay-area.html

----

see 1994 study 5.2 mb pdf

Document Data

Filename: Oliver Houck Yale Law Rev 1994.pdf

Type: PDF Document

Date Archived: 2011-09-18 13:56:32

Show less

Sunday, July 08, 2007

A Little History of the Pacific Legal Foundation

The legal team that successfully put their argument for resegregation before the conservative majority the Supreme Court has a history of standing up for the trampled rights of corporations, particularly corporate polluters. In the 70s, this group of crusaders supported all sorts of corporate rights, from spraying DDT and herbicides in national forests, to arguing for the inalienable rights developers in property disputes, to campaigning against affirmative action policies. From ExxonSecrets.org:

The Pacific Legal Foundation was the nation's first business oriented public interest law firm founded in 1973 by members of the California Chamber of Commerce. PLF was politically supported by officials in then Governor Ronald Reagan's cabinet, including founding member Edwin Meese.

PLF's initial financial support came from members of the California Chamber of Commerce and J. Simon Fluor of the FluorCorporation's oil, nuclear and mineral dollars. Anti-environmental from the start, PLF's early actions supported the use of DDT, the use of herbicides in national forests, and the use of public range land without requiring an environmental impact review. They also supported at least six pro-nuclear power cases before the early eighties while accepting funding from Pacific General Electric (PGE), a utility which has gained a great deal through the development of nuclear power in the Pacific Northwest. In the nineteen-eighties PLF won several cases that are considered land marks by those working on property rights issues today: Nollan v the California Coastal Commission and First Church, both Supreme Court victories which provide precedence for the takings litigation pursued today (Oliver Houck, "With Charity For All," Yale Law Journal, 1993).

:{And here is a chunk from a Saturday piece in the :{L. A. Times:(style="font-style:italic"):}:::{

}:}:

Who's behind the integration decision?

It's the Pacific Legal Foundation, champion of right-wing causes for 35 years.

:{By Mark Tushnet, MARK TUSHNET teaches constitutional law at Harvard Law School.

July 7, 2007}:

THE SEATTLE school integration case decided by the Supreme Court last month was brought in the name of a group called Parents Involved in Community Schools on behalf of Jill Kurfirst and her ninth-grade son. But it was a little-known, Sacramento-based organization called the Pacific Legal Foundation — a conservative public interest law firm involved in the case from the beginning — that developed many of the legal arguments five justices ultimately found persuasive.

Where did the foundation come from? The story begins with former Justice Lewis F. Powell. Shortly before he was nominated to the court in 1971, Powell, then a Virginia lawyer, wrote a memo to a friend at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce titled "Attack on the American Free Enterprise System." In it, Powell worried that liberal groups had nurtured specialist lawyers and developed litigation strategies to defend government regulation. Businesses, he argued, were suffering because they had a "disposition to appease" and weren't able to present a countervailing view of what constituted the public interest.

Powell's memo prodded the business community to help create a number of not-for-profit law firms devoted to arguing a conservative point of view. Ronald Zumbrun and Raymond Momboise, former advisors to California Gov. Ronald Reagan, founded the first one — the Pacific Legal Foundation — in 1973. On its website today, the foundation says it exists to fight "tyranny" engendered by "overzealous bureaucracies and government red tape" and that it is a foe of "government regulators and environmental extremists." Other issue areas: fighting racial preferences, combating eminent domain laws and encouraging government to take economic impact into account when designating critical habitat for endangered species.

:{After some initial enthusiasm, big business found these new public interest law firms less useful than it had hoped. The firms' case selection policies were erratic, and the winnable cases they brought — mostly against environmental regulations and land use laws — had few implications for the business community's larger concerns.

Big business soon turned to a newly developed, specialized Supreme Court bar in Washington (of which Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. was a leading member) to pursue its more important priorities: tort reform through judicial restrictions on punitive damages and interpreting national statutes in a business-friendly manner to reduce and eliminate penalties for business misconduct}:. Conservative public interest law firms played only minor roles in these cases.

By the time Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist died in 2005, most of the initiatives championed by the conservative public interest law firms — restricting federal power, putting constitutional limits on regulation and fighting environmental regulation — had hit a wall.

Still, Pacific Legal Foundation and other such law firms continued to operate, funded by donors interested in a conservative agenda. But always needing to raise more money from outsiders affected what the firms could do. They had to pick cases that garnered a lot of publicity, which meant they were not always the best for giving constitutional law a conservative cast. You can win cases (and publicity) if you can find "horror stories" about government regulation, but winning such cases makes few inroads toward more reasonable government regulations.

The Seattle case shows that conservative public interest law firms can win some big cases. These firms, however, are notorious for lacking follow-through. They get publicity from winning in the Supreme Court, not from slogging through the lower courts time and again to define the contours of the law on the ground. Winning in the Supreme Court may excite donors, but haggling with school boards over how to enforce the court's decisions does not.

The foundation's press release called last month's ruling "the most important decisions on the use of race since Brown vs. Board of Education." Five years earlier, Clint Bolick, a co-founder of the Institute for Justice, another conservative public interest law firm, hailed the Supreme Court's decision upholding the constitutionality of Cleveland's school voucher program as a Brown for the 21st century. . . .

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/08/02/puget-sound-whales-orcas_n_3696052.html?utm_hp_ref=green

Seattle (AP) — Killer whales that spend their summers in Puget Sound are a distinct population group and will remain protected under the Endangered Species Act, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration announced Friday.

NOAA's National Marine Fisheries Service spent a year reviewing a petition to delist the orcas. The petition was brought by the Sacramento-based Pacific Legal Foundation on behalf of California farmers who faced water restrictions to protect salmon the orcas eat. They argued the Puget Sound orcas were part of a larger north Pacific population and didn't qualify for the 2005 endangered species listing.

Things did not play out as simply as Powell intimated. Following the formation of the Pacific Legal Foundation in 1973 with the support from the California Chamber of Commerce, several other regional foundations were soon created under the auspices of the National Legal Center for the Public Interest (NLCPI). This network was organized geographically, not functionally, and held together by interlocking directorships. The result was “organizational turmoil” because as one insider told Teles “NLCPI had all the structural flaws of the Articles of Confederation” (p.63). Equally telling, the emphasis on filing amicus briefs displaced coherent litigation strategies and put the foundations on fund-raising treadmills. Most damning of all for Powell’s business-led strategy were unexpected tensions between business interests and conservative ideology. As Adam Smith cautioned long ago, business interests are not synonymous with the public interest however it is defined.

===

The Pacific Legal Foundation(PLF) was established in 1973-74 by a group of attorneys from California's Justice Department (then under the control of Attorney-General Ed Meese) to counter reform of the welfare system, and the liberal public interest legal groups that were pressing for better environmental and health regulations. Especially targeted were the Sierra Club and the Environmental Defense Fund.

Governor**Ronald Reagan**of California appears to have provided the required financial links to Pittsburg billionairre**Richard Mellon Scaife**who funded the initial office in Sacramento, and his friend and counsellor, Ed Meese (III) became one of the founders and its chief supporter. Its expressed aim was to use its financial and litigation power to "impact the public policy agenda."

An article in the Washington Post in May 1999 reveals that "Scaife's first grants in this area (conservative public interest law movement) were made in 1974 to the Pacific Legal Foundation. In its early years Scaife kept the PLF alive. Since the mid-'70s more than $20 million in Scaife money has gone to the conservative public interest law movement "on behalf of a market-oriented economics system, traditional property rights and limited government," in the words of an internal memo written by a Scaife aide in December 1980."

The day-to-day operations of the Foundation were in the hands of Ronald A Zumbrun, who's law firm Zumbrun & Findley ran most of the cases. Before his elevation to CEO of the PLF, Zumbrun had been a lawyer with the California Department of Public Works, the California Department of Social Welfare and the U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare.

By 1983 the organization was seen as a "growing force in public interest work" with an annual income of $2.5 million per year [3] and it had already begun to spawn other regional legal centers of a similar kind using Scaife funding. Not all of these, however, focussed on the aggressive use of litigation as did the PLF. According to a Philip Morris document urging the company to develop stronger links with the foundation: "It has participated in hundreds of cases at all court levels, winning the vast majority of those reaching final decision - including several before the U.S. Supreme Court."

It has also won many major social cases in California involving decisions to uphold ballot initiatives, ending state-aid to illegal immigrants, banning affirmative action, and replacing bilingual education with immersion in English.

Tobacco Industry associations

PLF is listed as a "key third party ally" in a September 14, 1999 Philip Morris document.[4]

By the mid 1990s the PLF had offices in Sacramento, Anchorage and Seattle and ran several key issues and programs:

Judicial Responsibility Project
College of Public Interest Law
Limited Government Project

In 1997-1998 the PLF joined forces with the $10 million funded (by Philip Morris) National Smokers Alliance, in a fierce and vindictive legal attack on Professor Stanton Arnold Glantz, a leader of California's main anti-smoking organization, Americans for Nonsmokers Rights [7] and attempted to brand him in the public mind as having something to hide ... a destroyer of legal document (a ruse the tobacco industry used itself on a massive scale). Glantz had received documents from the early tobacco industry whistleblowers, and he had established the first public-access Internet web site revealing how the industry operated.

Anti-Environment Policies

According to ExxonSecrets.org, the Pacific Legal Foundation has received $110,000 from ExxonMobil since 1998. The website goes on to state that:

Anti-environmental from the start, PLF's early actions supported the use of DDT, the use of herbicides in national forests, and the use of public range land without requiring an environmental impact review. They also supported at least six pro-nuclear power cases before the early eighties while accepting funding from Pacific General Electric (PGE), a utility which has gained a great deal through the development of nuclear power in the Pacific Northwest. In the 1980s, PLF won several cases that are considered landmarks by those working on property rights issues today: Nollan v the California Coastal Commission and First Church, both Supreme Court victories which provide precedence for the takings litigation pursued today (Oliver Houck, "With Charity For All," Yale Law Journal, 1993). In October 2003, PLF Vice President M. David Stirling had an Op-Ed published in which he defended President Bush's environmental record and condemned former President Clinton for endorsing the Kyoto Protocol.

Associated Legal Foundations

**American Legal Foundation** (Founded by Daniel Popeo (of WLF) and run by Michael Carvin) - It says: "we deal exclusively with media issues."
**Atlantic Legal Foundation** (PM supported) Run by James Richards with strong links to Stephen Whelan (husband of Elizabeth Whelan) and the ACSH - claims to be "committed to redressing the bias against business which manifests itself in favor of narrow "consumer" or "environmental" concerns."
**National Legal Center in the Public Interest** - Ernest Heuter (It does no litigation work, but is PM supported) It was founded by PLF, and has no members-only a board of directors. It acts as an umbrella and communications hub.
**Pacific Legal Center** (Sacramento) - Ron Zumbrun - This is the nation's oldest and largest with a 1983 staff of 20 (PM supported)
**Southern States Legal Center** (New Orleans) founded in 1983 by Elizabeth Williams.
**Mountain States Legal Center** (founded by the PLF)
Great Plains Legal Foundation (founded by the PLF), and now called Landmark (Kansas City)
**Landmark Legal Foundation** Run by Mark Levin. Scaife used this organization to fund the anti-Clinton Arkansas Project (He gave them $250,000 - and more than $1 million over a few years).
**National Chamber Litigation Center Inc.** (Washington) - affiliated with US Chamber of Commerce - run by Stephen Bokat - and says it is "unabashedly pro-business." (PM worked with them and the Business RoundTable)
**Capital Legal Foundation** (Washington) - run by Dan Burt and funded by Scaife
**Washington Legal Foundation** - founded by Daniel Popeo (independent of the PLF but supported by both PM and its subsidiary, Kraft Foods)

Contact Details

Pacific Legal Foundation

3900 Lennane Drive, Suite 200

Sacramento, CA 95834

Phone: (916) 419 7111 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting (916) 419 7111 end_of_the_skype_highlighting

Fax: (916) 419 7747

Email: plf AT pacificlegal.org

Web: http://www.pacificlegal.org/

External links

Bill Berkowitz, "Pacific Legal Foundation is on the wrong side of history: Partially funded by conservative foundations, the legal advocacy group is at the hub of fighting for the re-segregation of America", Media Transparency, December 11, 2006.
Media Mouse, "Anti-Affirmative Action Legal Group Threatens Litigation against GRPS, Mediamouse.org, April 25, 2007.

Ronald A. Zumbrun has over 40 years of experience in government and public interest law. He is the Managing Attorney of The Zumbrun Law Firm, a private Sacramento-based (now located in Arcata, California) public issues law firm. The firm’s focus is on public interest issues, litigation affecting government, and matters which advance individual and economic freedoms and concepts of free enterprise, private property rights and limited government.

In May of 2009, Mr. Zumbrun was one of 711 individuals selected for inclusion in the Yale Biographical Dictionary of American Law,the first book ever published to provide comprehensive biographical sketches "of the most eminent men and women in the history of American law." See "News" for more details.

In March of 2003, Mr. Zumbrun was honored by the California Lawyer magazine as an Attorney of the Year for his success in representing theMarine Forests Society against the California Coastal Commission. In a unanimous decision, the Court of Appeal, Third Appellate District, upheld a decision of the Sacramento County Superior Court finding the Coastal Commission to be unconstitutionally structured in violation of the California Constitution’s separation of powers clause. As a result, the California Legislature met in special session and changed the law.

From 2006 to 2013, Mr. Zumbrun has been named as a Northern California Super Lawyer by Super Lawyers, Law & Politics, and the publishers of San Francisco magazine. Super Lawyers are the top 5% of lawyers in Northern California named by their peers in their particular area of law.

Mr. Zumbrun also was selected by his peers to be included in the 2007 through 2013 editions of The Best Lawyers in Americain the specialties of Land Use & Zoning Law and Eminent Domain & Condemnation Law. This honor was based on 1.8 million confidential evaluations by the top attorneys in the country.

In 1973, Mr. Zumbrun co-founded the Pacific Legal Foundation (PLF) and served as its President and Chief Executive Officer until January 1, 1995. PLF is particularly well known for its involvement in environment and land use litigation and has achieved significant victories before the U.S. Supreme Court, including the historic 1987 property rights decision Nollan v. California Coastal Commission.

Prior to founding PLF, Mr. Zumbrun was a senior trial attorney for the California State Department of Public Works. In 1969, he was officially commended by the California Legislature for his accomplishments in legislative representation and in the handling of major litigation for the state. Mr. Zumbrun served under Governor Ronald Reagan as Deputy Director-Legal Affairs for the California Department of Social Welfare and was responsible for the legal aspects of the highly successful welfare reform effort during the early 1970s. He was one of the principal architects of California’sWelfare ReformAct of 1971 and later served in Washington, D.C., as special counsel to the United States Department of Health, Education and Welfare.

In 1989, he was appointed by Chief Justice of the California Supreme Court Malcolm Lucas to the California Judicial Council’s Advisory Committee on Private Judging and has been a certified arbitrator on the State of California’s Public Works Contract Arbitration Panel. He has served as Vice Chairman of the National Federalist Society’s Practice Group on Environmental Law and Property Rights and presently serves on the Executive Committee. He also previously served on the University of Southern California’s School of Public Administration Advisory Board and the Editorial Board of Comstock’s Magazine. He was a member of the Rotary Club of Sacramento.

He was co-author of the award-winning publication “No-Growth and Related Land Use Problems: An Overview” (ABA 1981). He also was one of the authors of Bringing Justice to the People: The Story of the Freedom-Based Public Interest Law Movement published by the Heritage Foundation in 2004.

Mr. Zumbrun received the Freedoms Foundation at Valley Forge’s George Washington Honor Medal, their highest award in the public address category, for his March 20, 1984 presentation to the Town Hall of California on the subject of individual and economic freedom. In 2003, he received the Heritage Foundation’s Spirit of Justice Award, one of only five who had been so honored. In 2004, he was awarded the Medallion of Freedom by the Claremont Institute, Center for Constitutional Jurisprudence.

Mr. Zumbrun is a 1961 graduate of Boalt Hall School of Law, University of California, Berkeley. He graduated from Pomona College in 1957 with a B.A. in economics and is a member of the California Bar Association, the Bar of the United States Supreme Court, the California Supreme Court, the United States Court of Federal Claims, numerous federal Circuit and District Courts and the District of Columbia. He and his wife Ann reside in Arcata, California, and have three adult children.

Pacific Legal 2

Right-wing media attacks focus on the majority’s decision to gut the Clean Water Act

Why the 5-4 split between the concurring justices matters

CONTENTS

Background

Personnel

Litigation Areas

PROPERTY RIGHTS

FREE SPEECH

ECONOMIC LIBERTY

EQUALITY BEFORE THE LAW

SEPARATION OF POWERS

Supreme Court Victories

KNICK V. TOWNSHIP OF SCOTT, PENNSYLVANIA (2019)

WEYERHAEUSER/MARKLE V. U.S. FISH AND WILDLIFE SERVICE (2018)

MINNESOTA VOTERS ALLIANCE V. MANSKY(2018)

NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF MANUFACTURERS V. DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE (2018)

U.S. ARMY CORPS OF ENGINEERS V. HAWKES(2018)

ST. JOHNS RIVER WATER MANAGEMENT DISTRICT V. KOONTZ (2013)

SACKETT V. ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY (2012)

RAPANOS V. UNITED STATES (2006)

PALAZZOLO V. RHODE ISLAND (2001)

SUITUM V. TAHOE REGIONAL PLANNING AGENCY (1997)

KELLER V. STATE BAR OF CALIFORNIA (1990)

NOLLAN V. CALIFORNIA COASTAL COMMISSION(1987)

Finances

Virgin Islands Subpoena Controversy

Conflict with Sheldon Whitehouse

“CREEPY FRONT GROUPS” ALLEGATION

PALAZZOLO CASE

References...

Tobacco Industry associations

Anti-Environment Policies

Associated Legal Foundations

Contact Details

PLF Client Highlight

Topics

Sunday, July 08, 2007

A Little History of the Pacific Legal Foundation

It's the Pacific Legal Foundation, champion of right-wing causes for 35 years.

Tobacco Industry associations

Anti-Environment Policies

Associated Legal Foundations

Contact Details

External links

Attachments