by Zach Bigalke

Created on: April 02, 2007   Last Updated: April 19, 2007

Too often, it is the often-overlooked branch of our federal government that affects the real decisions facing our nations more prudently than either of the other, more-transient branches are capable. Whereas the Clinton administration placed merit into protecting environmental interests, the Bush administration has debated semantics while dragging its feet on pressing matters. But it is the non-elected arm which has come out to aid the environmental cause in a way neither legislation nor enforcement possibly could. Elections are great for many reasons, but perhaps the greatest is that it allows for presidents from a broad spectrum of ideologies to appoint our lifetime judiciary.

The Supreme Court ruled today in a 5-4 decision on case 05-1120, Massachusetts v. EPA, in a landmark decision that will force the Bush administration to review and revise its increasingly-lax policies on global warming and greenhouse emissions. First petitioned to the Supreme Court on 2 May 2006, this case was brought by twenty-five states and environmental groups which have become increasingly perturbed with Bush's inaction on environmental degradation leading to global warming. The administration, in turn, has waffled in providing a decisive response. Instead making excuses, including its foreign-policy considerations to oil-providing nations openly hostile to our regime, Bush has even argued whether the Environmental Protection Agency has the right to regulate tailpipe emissions under the 1990 Clean Air Act and its 1997 revisions.

The nine justices of our highest judicial body faced three important questions relating to emissions regulation:

Does the 1990 Clean Air Act give the Environmental Protection Agency the authority to regulate greenhouse-gas emissions from automobiles?

Does the Environmental Protection Agency reserve the right not to regulate those emissions?

Do states have the right to sue the Environmental Protection Agency to challenge decisions it feels fail to adequately address problems?

The first question addresses the range of permission granted to the EPA by the Clean Air Act to regulate automobile emissions. To answer this, a better understanding of the Clean Air Act must be reached. This legislation grants the EPA the right to set limits on the emission of any particulate deemed dangerous to the national air quality. Working with state environmental protection agencies, the EPA was granted broader powers of execution in 1990 to enforce its regulatory levels. And

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