University of Colorado Law Review

Environmental citizen suits were founded on the belief that empowering organizations and individuals to take legal action would provide a backstop against lax federal or state programs. Working in conjunction with the system of cooperative federalism, citizen suits were designed to uphold minimum levels of environmental protection and to provide a restraint on so called “races to the bottom” in which states compete for economic development by relaxing environmental standards. To our knowledge, no one has considered whether the geographic distribution of citizen suits could Continue reading →

While many local governments track greenhouse gas (“GHG”) emissions, almost all of them exclude most GHGs associated with consumption. These consumption-based emissions stem from the lifecycle production, pre-purchase transportation, sale, and disposal of goods, food, and services produced outside of a local jurisdiction but consumed inside the jurisdiction. Based on the limited data measuring extraterritorial emissions, these consumption-based emissions amount to more than half—and in some places more than three-fourths—of GHG emissions directly connected to local consumption patterns and behaviors. This Article argues that local Continue reading →

International Water Law has developed a set of rules for resolving interstate fresh water disputes that govern both the substance of these disputes and the conduct of the disputing states. “Equitable and reasonable utilization” is commonly considered as the leading substantive rule, “no significant harm” as subsidiary to it, and the “duty to cooperate” as the central procedural rule. The purpose of this Article is to analyze the merits of these substantive and procedural rules under the lens of the celebrated Coase theorem. The “normative” Continue reading →

Every ten years, states redraw their congressional district boundaries following the results of the U.S. Census. This important process determines the boundaries of districts that will be represented in Congress. As a result, district boundaries selected through the redistricting process can directly impact future congressional elections and the subsequent representation of citizens’ concerns in Congress. If districts are drawn to favor one political party over another, certain sections of the population may see their political power diminished and thus be less fairly represented in Congress. Continue reading →

Within the first year of Donald Trump’s presidency, his Administration repealed, withdrew, or modified hundreds of regulations and agency decisions.[1] Although these rollbacks encompassed a wide array of administrative actions across a variety of regulatory fields,[2] the most significant and concentrated effort from the Trump Administration focused on destroying Obama-era environmental regulations.[3] President Trump himself promised to get “rid of [the Environmental Protection Agency] in every form,”[4] and his Administration attacked climate change policies by eliminating greenhouse gas (GHG) regulations that bound the nation’s biggest Continue reading →