citizen suit

Richardson, a United States taxpayer, brought this action in the United States District Court for the District of Colorado challenging the constitutionality of the Central Intelligence Agency Act of 1949. He alleged that the Act's provisions permitting the Agency to account for its expenditures solely on the certificate of the Director of Central Intelligence violate the Statement and Account Clause of Article I, Section 9, Clause 7 of the Constitution. Richardson claimed injury as a taxpayer because the challenged law prevented him from learning how Congress spends public money and from taking steps to correct what he believed to be illegal and unconstitutional uses of public funds. In 1967 Richardson wrote to the Government Printing Office requesting documents published by the Government in compliance with the constitutional clause. The Fiscal Service of the Bureau of Accounts of the Department of the Treasury replied by sending copies of the Combined Statement of Receipts, Expenditures, and Balances of the United States Government along with monthly and daily reports. Richardson then wrote again, quoting part of the CIA Act and asking whether the statute cast reflection upon the authenticity of the Treasury's Statement and how he could receive further information on CIA expenditures. The Bureau replied that it had no other available information. Richardson next asserted that the CIA Act was repugnant to the Constitution and requested that the Treasury Department seek an opinion of the Attorney General, but the Department declined. Richardson's complaint asked the court to issue a permanent injunction enjoining the defendants from publishing their Combined Statement and representing it as the fulfillment of the constitutional mandate until the statement fully complies. The District Court dismissed the complaint on the ground that Richardson lacked standing and that the claim presented a nonjusticiable political question. The Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit reversed, holding that Richardson had standing as a taxpayer under Flast v. Cohen and that the claim was justiciable. The Supreme Court granted certiorari.

Laidlaw Environmental Services acquired a hazardous waste incinerator facility in Roebuck, South Carolina in 1986 that included a wastewater treatment plant. Shortly thereafter, it obtained an NPDES permit effective January 1, 1987 authorizing limited discharges of pollutants including mercury into the North Tyger River. Laidlaw repeatedly exceeded the permit limits, violating the mercury discharge limit on 489 occasions between 1987 and 1995. On April 10, 1992, Friends of the Earth and Citizens Local Environmental Action Network sent Laidlaw a 60-day notice letter of their intent to file a citizen suit under the Clean Water Act. On June 9, 1992, the South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control reached a settlement with Laidlaw requiring payment of a $100,000 civil penalty. On June 12, 1992, FOE filed its federal citizen suit seeking declaratory and injunctive relief plus civil penalties. After a bench trial the District Court found the violations, imposed a $405,800 penalty, awarded litigation costs to FOE, and denied injunctive relief because Laidlaw had achieved substantial compliance since August 1992. The Fourth Circuit assumed without deciding that FOE initially had standing but held that the case had become moot because civil penalties payable to the government would not redress any injury FOE had suffered. The Supreme Court granted certiorari; after the Fourth Circuit decision but before argument the entire Roebuck facility was permanently closed, dismantled, and placed for sale with all discharges permanently ceased.

In October 1999, nineteen private organizations filed a rulemaking petition with the EPA requesting regulation of greenhouse gas emissions from new motor vehicles under section 202 of the Clean Air Act. The petition asserted that carbon dioxide and other gases were heat-trapping greenhouse gases that had accelerated climate change, with carbon dioxide as the most important contributor according to the IPCC's 1995 report. The EPA received more than fifty thousand comments after requesting public input in 2001. A National Research Council report from 2001, prepared at the White House's request, stated that greenhouse gases from human activities were causing surface air temperatures to rise. On September 8, 2003, the EPA denied the petition on two grounds: the Clean Air Act did not authorize regulation of greenhouse gases from motor vehicles, and even assuming authority, the agency would not regulate due to scientific uncertainty about causation and concerns that regulation would conflict with the President's comprehensive approach involving voluntary programs and international negotiations. The denial order referenced Congress's decision in 1990 not to enact binding emissions limitations and the political history of climate change issues. Petitioners including the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and other states and private organizations then sought review in the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. The D.C. Circuit denied the petition for review in 2005. The Supreme Court granted certiorari in 2006 to address the issues raised by the denial. Massachusetts submitted affidavits showing that global sea levels rose 10 to 20 centimeters over the 20th century, already causing loss of coastal land owned by the Commonwealth, with projections of further inundation by 2100. The United States transportation sector alone emitted more than 1.7 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide in 1999, accounting for over 6 percent of worldwide emissions.

For about 50 years, the predecessors of respondent Union Gas Co. operated a coal gasification plant near Brodhead Creek in Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania, which produced coal tar as a by-product. The plant was dismantled around 1950. A few years later, Pennsylvania took part in major flood-control efforts along the creek. In 1980, shortly after acquiring easements to the property along the creek, the Commonwealth struck a large deposit of coal tar while excavating the creek. The coal tar began to seep into the creek, and the Environmental Protection Agency determined that the tar was a hazardous substance and declared the site the Nation's first emergency Superfund site. Working together, Pennsylvania and the Federal Government cleaned up the area, and the Federal Government reimbursed the State for clean-up costs of $720,000. To recoup these costs, the United States sued Union Gas under §§ 104 and 106 of CERCLA, claiming that Union Gas was liable for such costs because the company and its predecessors had deposited coal tar into the ground near Brodhead Creek. Union Gas filed a third-party complaint against Pennsylvania, asserting that the Commonwealth was responsible for at least a portion of the costs because it was an owner or operator of the hazardous-waste site. Its flood-control efforts had negligently caused or contributed to the release of the coal tar into the creek. The District Court dismissed the complaint, accepting Pennsylvania's claim that its Eleventh Amendment immunity barred the suit. A divided panel of the Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit affirmed, finding no clear expression of congressional intent to hold States liable in monetary damages under CERCLA. While Union Gas' petition for certiorari was pending, Congress amended CERCLA by passing SARA. The Supreme Court granted certiorari, vacated the Court of Appeals' opinion, and remanded for reconsideration in light of these amendments. On remand, the Court of Appeals held that the language of CERCLA, as amended, clearly rendered States liable for monetary damages and that Congress had the power to do so when legislating pursuant to the Commerce Clause. The Supreme Court granted certiorari, 485 U. S. 958 (1988), and affirmed.