444 U.S. 51 (1979)
In 1940 Congress passed the Eagle Protection Act and in 1918 it passed the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, both conservation measures directed at preventing the destruction of bald eagles, golden eagles, and migratory birds.1 Appellees consist of several owners of commercial enterprises that deal in Indian artifacts, one employee of such an enterprise, and one professional appraiser. Several of the artifacts they possess incorporate feathers from eagles and migratory birds that were obtained before the federal statutes took effect.2
The Secretary of the Interior issued regulations under both statutes that allow continued possession and transportation of such pre-existing bird parts without a permit but expressly forbid their importation, exportation, purchase, sale, barter, or any offer to purchase, sell, trade, or barter.3 Two appellees, L. Douglas Allard and Pierre Bovis, were prosecuted for selling pre-existing artifacts containing protected bird parts, resulting in Allard's conviction under the Eagle Protection Act and charges against Bovis under both statutes.4
Appellees responded by filing an action for declaratory and injunctive relief in the United States District Court for the District of Colorado.5 The complaint alleged that the statutes do not reach the sale of artifacts whose constituent bird parts were acquired before the statutes' effective dates and, in the alternative, that any application of the statutes and regulations to their property would violate the Fifth Amendment.6
A three-judge district court convened pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2282 construed the statutes as inapplicable to pre-existing, lawfully obtained bird products, declared the interpretive regulations void, entered judgment invalidating the regulations as against appellees' property rights, and enjoined the government from interfering with the exercise of those rights, including rights of sale, barter, or exchange.7 The Supreme Court noted probable jurisdiction.8
Whether the Eagle Protection Act prohibits commercial transactions in parts of protected eagles that were lawfully acquired before the Act's effective date?9
The Eagle Protection Act, 16 U.S.C. § 668(a), makes it unlawful to take, possess, sell, purchase, barter, offer to sell, purchase or barter, transport, export or import protected eagles, with a narrow proviso that nothing shall be construed to prohibit possession or transportation of parts lawfully taken prior to the effective date.10
Yes. The Act's exhaustive enumeration of prohibited acts in § 668(a) treats sale and purchase as distinct from the limited exception for possession or transportation of pre-existing parts.11 The legislative history from the 1940 Senate Report confirms Congress declined to exempt sales.12 The regulations at 50 CFR § 22.2(a) therefore validly bar commercial transactions regardless of when the feathers were obtained.13
The Eagle Protection Act prohibits commercial transactions in parts of protected eagles that were lawfully acquired before the Act's effective date.14
Whether the Migratory Bird Treaty Act authorizes regulations that prohibit commercial transactions in parts of protected migratory birds that were lawfully acquired before the Act's effective date?15
The Migratory Bird Treaty Act, 16 U.S.C. § 703, broadly prohibits pursuing, hunting, taking, possessing, offering for sale, selling, bartering, purchasing, shipping, exporting, importing, or transporting protected migratory birds and their parts, subject to regulatory exceptions, without any statutory carve-out for pre-existing artifacts.16
Yes. The comprehensive statutory ban on its face reaches all bird parts, and the absence of an express pre-existing exception, unlike the explicit one in the Eagle Protection Act, indicates Congress intended to permit the Secretary to bar sales.17 The structure of related conservation statutes, the Canadian implementing law known to Congress, and subsequent amendments confirm that the regulations at 50 CFR § 21.2(a) validly prohibit commercial transactions in pre-Act parts.18
The Migratory Bird Treaty Act authorizes regulations that prohibit commercial transactions in parts of protected migratory birds that were lawfully acquired before the Act's effective date.19
Whether regulations barring the sale of pre-existing bird parts in Indian artifacts violate the Fifth Amendment property rights of the artifacts' owners?20
Government regulation adjusting property rights for the public good does not effect a taking under the Fifth Amendment where the owner retains the full bundle of rights except one strand, such as the right to sell, and no physical invasion or compelled surrender occurs, as established in Penn Central Transportation Co. v. New York City.21
No. The regulations impose no physical invasion or surrender requirement on appellees' artifacts and leave intact the rights to possess, transport, donate, or devise the items.22 Although the most profitable use is barred, reduction in value alone does not constitute a taking, and analogous prohibitions on sale of pre-existing liquor stocks were upheld in Everard's Breweries v. Day and Jacob Ruppert, Inc. v. Caffey without violating the Fifth Amendment.23
Regulations barring the sale of pre-existing bird parts in Indian artifacts do not violate the Fifth Amendment property rights of the artifacts' owners.24