West Virginia v. EPA: It’s Dé·jà Vu All Over Again

Image courtesy of US Bureau of Land Management

· The decision in West Virginia v. EPA is as important for what it doesn’t say as for what it does.

· Although the Supreme Court left in tack many of EPA’s regulatory powers, it limited its regulatory reach on existing stationary sources of greenhouse gases.

· Without the need to win over “swing” justices, the conser­vat­ive wing of the US Supreme Court has little incent­ive to moder­ate its posi­tions or embrace an incre­mental approach to legal change, much less look for ways to engage with the other side or avoid reach­ing divis­ive ques­tions.

· The decision in West Virginia heightens the importance of state and local governments in combatting climate change.

It was hardly happenstance that the Supreme Court justices waited — until they were packed and halfway out the door — to announce their decisions in cases they knew would fan the flames of the culture war that has gripped the nation since the turn of the third millennium.

In Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, the high court held that the Constitution does not confer a right to abortion. The decision overturned Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey — making abortion a matter for state governments to wrangle with.