MANUEL LUJAN, JR., SECRETARY OF THE INTERIOR, ET AL., PETITIONERS
V. NATIONAL WILDLIFE FEDERATION, ET AL.

   No. 89-640

   In The Supreme Court Of The United States

   October Term, 1989

   On Writ Of Certiorari To The United States Court Of Appeals For The
District Of Columbia Circuit

   Brief For The Petitioners

                       PARTIES TO THE PROCEEDING

   The petitioners are Manuel Lujan, Jr., in his official capacity as
Secretary of the Interior;  Cy Jamison, Director of the Bureau of Land
Management;  and the Department of the Interior.  The respondent is
the National Wildlife Federation.  In addition, the following parties
intervened in the proceedings before the district court:  Mountain
States Legal Foundation;  Rep. John Seiberling, succeeded by Rep.
Bruce Vento, who intervened for the purpose of supporting respondent
on Count II of the Complaint;  and The Trust for Public Land, The
Department of Water and Power in the City of Los Angeles, The County
of Inyo, California, and The California Energy Company, Inc., each of
which intervened for the purpose of obtaining an exemption from the
preliminary injunction.  Finally, ASARCO, Inc. sought intervention in
the district court and, as a party to the proceedings before the court
of appeals, appealed from the denial of intervention.

            TABLE OF CONTENTS
   Questions presented
   Parties to the proceeding
   Opinions below
   Jurisdiction
   Constitutional and statutory provisions
   Statement
      A. The Bureau of Land Management's review of
         "withdrawals" and "classifications" of public
         lands
         1. "Withdrawals" and "classifications" of public
            lands
         2. The Federal Land Policy and Management
            Act (FLPMA)
         3. Classification and withdrawal review
      B. The present controversy
   Introduction and summary of argument
   Argument:
      I. The allegations contained in the Peterson affidavit
         are insufficient to confer standing on respondent
         to sue
         A. To secure standing to sue, a plaintiff must
            clearly allege a distinct and palpable injury
            resulting from the challenged action
         B. Under the governing standards, respondent
            cannot predicate standing to sue on the allegations
            contained in the Peterson Affidavit
         C. The court of appeals' misapplication of
            standing principles implicates serious

separation-of-powers

            concerns
     II. The district court correctly entered summary
         judgment against respondent for lack of standing
         in this case
         A. The district court did not abuse its discretion
            in refusing to permit respondent to file
            supplemental affidavits addressed to the
            question of standing
         B. The district court correctly held that respondent's
            allegations of "informational
            standing" were insufficient
   Conclusion

                            OPINIONS BELOW

   The opinion of the court of appeals (Pet. App. 1a-25a) is reported
at 878 F.2d 422.  The opinion of the district court (Pet. App.
26a-37a) is reported at 699 F. Supp. 327.  Prior opinions of the court
of appeals (Pet. App. 38a-115a, 116a-118a) are reported, respectively,
at 835 F.2d 305 and 844 F.2d 889, while prior opinions of the district
court (Pet. App. 119a-136a, 137a-150a) are reported, respectively, at
676 F. Supp. 271 and 676 F. Supp. 280.

                             JURISDICTION

   The judgment of the court of appeals (Pet. App. 151a-152a) was
entered on June 20, 1989.  On September 10, 1989, the Chief Justice
extended the time for filing a petition for a writ of certiorari to
and including October 18, 1989, and the petition was filed on that
day.  It was granted on January 16, 1990.  The jurisdiction of this
Court rests on 28 U.S.C. 1254(1).

                CONSTITUTIONAL AND STATUTORY PROVISIONS

   Article III, Section 2 of the Constitution extends "(t)he judicial
Power * * * to all Cases (and) * * * Controversies."

   The Administrative Procedure Act, 5 U.S.C. 702, provides, in
relevant part:

         A person suffering legal wrong because of agency action, or
      adversely affected or aggrieved by agency action within the
      meaning of a relevant statute, is entitled to judicial review
      thereof.

                          QUESTIONS PRESENTED

   1. Whether, in a lawsuit challenging a vast array of government
decisions affecting the use or disposition of approximately
180,000,000 acres of public land, an environmental organization may
establish its standing to sue by relying on an affidavit asserting
that one member of the organization makes use of property "in the
vicinity of" a particular 2,000,000-acre parcel, only 4,500 acres of
which were affected by one of the challenged decisions.

   2. Whether the district court properly entered summary judgment
against the respondent for its failure to make a timely showing of its
standing to sue.

                               STATEMENT

   Respondent National Wildlife Federation brought this action to
challenge hundreds of executive branch decisions affecting
approximately 180,000,000 acres of public land.  In support of its
standing to sue, respondent submitted an affidavit of Peggy Kay
Peterson, one of its members.  Peterson alleged an injury to her use
of land "in the vicinity of" a 2,000,000-acre area known as Green
Mountain/South Pass, Wyoming, arising from a decision by the Bureau of
Land Management to terminate "Classification W-6228," which had
shielded from mining activity some 4,455 acres scattered within the
region.  On the basis of the Peterson affidavit alone, the court of
appeals found respondent to have standing to challenge not only the
single decision from which Peterson's injury allegedly arose, but also
hundreds of other decisions, affecting many millions of additional
acres of public land.

   A. The Bureau of Land Management's Review of "Withdrawals" and
"Classifications" of Public Lands

   1. "Withdrawals" and "Classifications" of Public Lands

   For much of the Nation's history, federal lands policy was designed
to dispose of public lands, not manage them.  In the nineteenth
century, for example, Congress enacted homesteading laws allowing
citizens to obtain title to federal land simply by living on it, 43
U.S.C. 161 et seq., or to secure mineral rights simply by staking a
claim and mining the land, Mining Law of 1872 (Act of May 10, 1872),
30 U.S.C. 22 et seq.  Congress also granted large tracts to the
railroads and to newly formed States.  See, e.g., "An Act to Aid in
the Construction of a Railroad and Telegraph Line from the Missouri
River to the Pacific Ocean," Act of July 1, 1862, ch. 120, 12 Stat.
489 (July 1862), as amended, Act of July 2, 1864, ch. 216, 13 Stat.
356 (July 2, 1864);  Wyoming Act of Admission, ch. 664, Sections 1-14,
26 Stat. 222-224 (July 10, 1890).

   During those early years, the only way to reserve land from the
operation of such disposal laws was to effect a "withdrawal." A
"withdrawal" removes or segregates a specific tract of land from the
public domain, and thus from the application of one or more disposal
laws.  /1/ J.A. 140.  Typically, the Department of the Interior
"withdrew" particular parcels for specific uses -- such as, for
example, military bases, dams, or irrigation and agricultural
projects.  J.A. 140-141.

   In 1934, Congress supplemented the Secretary's withdrawal authority
by adding a second tool -- "classification." The Taylor Grazing Act,
ch. 865, 48 Stat. 1269 (as amended, 43 U.S.C. 315f), gave the
Secretary broad authority to "classify" public lands as suitable for
either disposal or federal retention and management.

   Armed with both withdrawal and classification authority, President
Roosevelt issued two executive orders (Exec. Order No. 6910, Nov. 26,
1934;  Exec. Order No. 6964, Feb. 5, 1935), temporarily withdrawing
all unreserved public land from disposal, until such time as those
lands could be classified.  Andrus v. Utah, 446 U.S. 500, 511-520
(1980).  Pursuant to the Taylor Grazing Act, 43 U.S.C. 315f, and the
1964 Classification and Multiple Use Act, 43 U.S.C. 1411 et seq., 78
Stat. 986 (expired 1970), the Secretary was thereafter required to
review the public lands and determine which should be classified for
retention in federal ownership, and which should be classified for
disposal.  By 1970, the Secretary had classified some 177,630,000
acres of public land for retention.  J.A. 99.  In addition, as a
result of further congressional and executive action, withdrawals had
removed many millions of additional acres from the operation of the
public disposal laws and from multiple use management.  Public Land
Law Commission, One Third of the Nation's Land 53 (1970).

   Over time, however, the ad hoc, eclectic system of classifications
and withdrawals proved unmanageable.  By 1970, the Public Land Review
Commission, appointed by Congress to study the matter, found that
"virtually all" of the country's public domain had been withdrawn or
classified for retention.  The Commission "experienced great
difficulty" in discerning "the extent of existing Executive
withdrawals and the degree to which withdrawals overlap each other."
One Third of the Nation's Land, supra, 52.  It also discovered that
federal agencies had not maintained "accurate records that show the
purposes for which specific areas ha(d) been withdrawn," or the "uses
that (could) be made of such areas under the public land laws." Ibid.
The Commission therefore recommended a complete review of existing
withdrawals and classifications -- "a necessary step," the Commission
declared, "to 'free' the public lands of encumbrances to effective
land use planning for the future." Id. at 52-53.

   2. The Federal Land Policy and Management Act (FLPMA)

   In light of the Commission's recommendations, Congress, in 1976,
enacted the Federal Land Policy and Management Act, 43 U.S.C. 1701 et
seq. (FLPMA), which embodied many of the Commission's objectives.
FLPMA repealed most of the miscellaneous laws governing disposal of
public land, Sections 1701 et seq.  The Act also stated an explicit
policy in favor of retaining public lands for multiple use management.
 The statute prescribed that management of public land was to be "on
the basis of multiple use and sustained yield unless otherwise
specified by law." /2/ Section 102(a)(1), 43 U.S.C. 1701(a)(1).  And
to achieve its overall objectives, FLPMA required land use planning
for all of the public lands.

   Although FLPMA did not mandate a particular type of land use plan,
it did identify nine criteria that land use plans should reflect.
Section 202(c), 43 U.S.C. 1712(c), requires that planners (1) observe
the principles of multiple use and sustained yield;  (2) use an
interdisciplinary approach;  (3) give priority to the designation and
protection of areas of critical environmental concern;  (4) rely on
the inventory of the public lands to the extent it is available;  (5)
consider present and potential uses of the public lands;  (6) consider
relative scarcity and alternatives to resource exhaustion (including
recycling);  (7) weigh long-term benefits against short-term benefits;
 (8) provide for compliance with applicable pollution control laws;
and (9) coordinate land use inventory, management, and planning with
the land use planning and management programs of other federal
agencies, States, and local governments.

   Those nine criteria, however, were not novel.  Well before FLPMA
was enacted, BLM had begun to effect multiple use management by
developing Management Framework Plans (MFPs).  By late 1969, the
Bureau had developed detailed procedures for comprehensive land use
planning through MFPs, and MFPs have continued to be used after
FLPMA's enactment.  /3/ In 1979, BLM issued revised regulations
calling for the development of a different type of plan, known as a
Resource Management Plan (RMP).  43 C.F.R. 1610.8(a) (1988).  Those
regulations recognize the continued use of MFPs, and provide for the
gradual phase-in of RMPs to replace the MFPs when appropriate.  See,
e.g., 55 Fed. Reg. 4911 (Feb. 12, 1990).

   In addition to prescribing the use of planning criteria, FLPMA
confers upon the Secretary broad authority to manage the public lands
-- including the authority to review existing classifications and
withdrawals.  With respect to classifications, Section 202(d), 43
U.S.C. 1712(d), provides:

         Any classification of public lands or any land use plan in
      effect on October 21, 1976, is subject to review in the land use
      planning process conducted under this section, and all public
      lands, regardless of classification, are subject to inclusion in
      any land use plan developed pursuant to this section.  The
      Secretary may modify or terminate any such classification
      consistent with such land use plans.

   In addition, Section 204(a), 43 U.S.C. 1714(a), authorizes the
Secretary to "make, modify, extend or revoke" withdrawals.  Pursuant
to Section 204(l), 43 U.S.C. 1714(l), moreover, the Secretary is
required to complete a review of all withdrawals of non-BLM
administered federal lands in 11 Western States, and to report his
findings to the President for transmission to Congress by 1991.
Congress also directed the Secretary generally to review all
withdrawals in those 11 States that closed federal lands managed by
BLM and the United States Forest Service to appropriation under the
Mining Law of 1872 (Act of May 10, 1872, ch. 152, 17 Stat. 91, as
amended;  30 U.S.C. 22 et seq.) or to leasing under the Mineral Lands
Leasing Act of 1920 (ch. 85, 41 Stat. 437, as amended;  30 U.S.C. 181
et seq.).  Section 204(l)(1), 43 U.S.C. 1714(l)(1).

   3. Classification and withdrawal review

   a. The Department of the Interior had determined as early as the
mid-1950's that some form of review of classifications and withdrawals
was necessary.  J.A. 141.  Many withdrawals had become outdated,
proposed projects had been abandoned, and in other cases the land
character had changed.  Ibid.  In addition, many agencies for which a
withdrawal had been made no longer needed it, or, in a few instances,
the agency itself had ceased to exist.  Ibid.  And the enactment of
FLPMA in 1976 -- with its broad delegation to the Secretary to review
withdrawals and classifications -- gave this review process an even
higher priority in the agency.

   The review process -- particularly with respect to classifications
(which affected by far the majority of the lands at issue in this
case, see J.A. 164-165) -- was detailed and complex, drawing on the
technical skills of a wide range of planners and land-use experts.
The Secretary examined each classification as part of a coordinated
land use planning process, usually involving the development of an
MFP.  In accordance with agency regulations, moreover, each MFP was
accompanied by extensive public participation.  /4/

   b. The review of Classification W-6228 -- involving the land at
issue in the Peterson affidavit -- illustrates the process.  At the
outset, Classification W-6228 had segregated 2,077,702 acres of land
in the Green Mountain/South Pass area from appropriation under
agricultural land laws and from sales.  J.A. 132.  Of those
approximately 2,000,000 acres, Classification W-6228 had segregated
6,379 acres from mining as well.  Ibid.  BLM began the process of
preparing an MFP for the Green Mountain area in 1977 (J.A. 125);
following a lengthy and complex process, resulting in a number of
changes in the region's management, the agency terminated the
classification against mining for about 4,500 acres in the region.

   The first stage of the MFP involved preparation of a Unit Resource
Analysis consisting of several parts:  a base map indicating the
boundaries of the planning unit and the status of each parcel of land
within the unit;  a detailed description of the geographic and
environmental characteristics of the area, including analysis of all
the natural resources within the area;  analysis of the potential uses
of each of the resources within the area;  and an ecological profile
to ascertain and describe any unique or fragile areas within the
planning unit, to define the predominant land uses, and to identify
all important management considerations.  /5/ J.A. 125-126.  Next, BLM
developed resource objectives and recommendations.  Each objective and
planning recommendation was developed independently of the others, to
ensure that the planners would be aware of the full potential of each
resource.  /6/ J.A. 128.  Finally, BLM performed a "planning area
analysis," which provided an integrated account of the social,
economic, resource, and environmental features of the area, and made
tentative recommendations for resolution of any conflicts among the
resource objectives and recommendations.  J.A. 128-129, 133.  The
Green Mountain MFP was completed in 1981.  J.A. 131.  /7/

   In late 1981, BLM proposed a series of land use decisions based on
the MFP.  J.A. 131.  Among them was a decision to modify
Classification W-6228.  Like the review process overall, the
modification of Classification W-6228 was the product of sustained,
multi-factored analysis.  At the "blinders-on" stage, see note 6,
supra, the MFP had recommended that the mineral segregation
established by Classification W-6228 be revoked entirely, because of
the possibility of important gold and uranium deposits in the area.
J.A. 133.  A further, multiple-use analysis, however, disclosed that a
wholesale termination of the existing classification would conflict
with important recreational and historic uses of the land.  J.A.
133-134.  Accordingly, in September 1982, BLM decided to terminate the
mineral segregation on approximately 5,120 of the 6,379 acres
originally segregated by W-6228.  J.A. 135.  BLM retained the
segregation on 959 acres in South Pass to protect wildlife values, on
120 acres in the Green Mountain area to protect significant
recreational sites, on 80 acres in the Castle Gardens area to protect
an important archaeological site, and on 100 acres in Beaver Rim to
protect a proposed "Area of Critical Environmental Concern." Ibid.
Pursuant to Section 202(d) of FLPMA, 43 U.S.C. 1712(d), BLM determined
that those decisions were consistent with existing land use plans.
J.A. 135-136.

   Thereafter, the Wyoming State Game and Fish Department raised new
concerns about a possible impact on moose habitat.  In response, BLM
revised its determination (J.A. 136-137), and elected to retain the
segregation on an additional 768 acres.  On May 10, 1984, BLM
published in the Federal Register its final decision, terminating the
mineral segregation as to 4,455 acres and retaining it on 1,913 acres.
49 Fed. Reg. 19,904-19,905.  /8/

   c. By 1986, BLM had terminated classifications on close to
160,000,000 acres.  J.A. 164.  Pursuant to Section 204(a) of FLPMA,
moreover, BLM had also revoked withdrawals covering some 19,000,000
acres.  J.A. 144.  /9/ Each of those approximately 1,250 orders was
tailored to the unique circumstances of the particular land and other
resources involved.  For example, three classification orders on 1,418
acres in the State of Washington were terminated because the orders
had classified the lands for sale under the Small Tract Act, which
FLPMA had repealed.  J.A. 167.  At the other end of the scale, 25
classification orders on almost 23 million acres in Utah were revoked
because the lands had been classified for "multiple use management and
segregated from appropriation under the agricultural entry laws * * *"
(J.A. 168);  because FLPMA had repealed the agricultural entry laws
and mandated multiple use management, those classifications had become
moot.  J.A. 169.  BLM also revoked withdrawals that had segregated 1.7
million acres for the use of federal agencies that no longer needed
the land.  J.A. 142-143, 145.  Those included relinquishments from the
Coast Guard of 11 acres reserved for lighthouse purposes, as well as
thousands of acres from the Army for lands no longer needed for
weapons testing purposes.  J.A. 146-148.  And with respect to an
additional 4.8 million acres, BLM revoked withdrawals for "record
clearing" purposes.  /10/ J.A. 143-144, 145.

   B. The Present Controversy

   1. a. On July 15, 1985, respondent National Wildlife Federation
(hereinafter "respondent") filed the present action, charging that BLM
had undertaken a massive program to lift "protective" restrictions on
federal lands, in violation of the provisions of FLPMA, the National
Environmental Policy Act, 42 U.S.C. 4321 et seq., and the
Administrative Procedure Act, 5 U.S.C. 551 et seq.  Representative
Seiberling (who has since retired from the House) intervened in
support of respondent, and Mountain States Legal Foundation (MSLF)
intervened in support of petitioners.

   As subsequently amended, respondent's complaint alleged that the
Federation and its members "are suffering and will continue to suffer
injury in fact as a result of the challenged actions." J.A. 12.  In
particular, the complaint continued, the Federation's members "use and
enjoy the environmental resources that will be adversely affected by
the challenged actions." Ibid.  The complaint did not, however,
identify the "adversely affected" resources, other than by appending a
list of 814 notices of "land status actions" published in the Federal
Register between January 1, 1981 and the date of the complaint.  J.A.
25-50.  Even that list, the complaint asserted, was "not intended to
be inclusive." J.A. 15.

   With those allegations of standing as a predicate, respondent
asserted three principal causes of action.  First, respondent claimed
that petitioners violated FLPMA by failing to prepare RMPs in
connection with their classification terminations (covering about 160
million acres) (Count I).  Second, the complaint alleged that
petitioners violated Section 204(l) of FLPMA when they revoked certain
withdrawals (affecting about 20 million acres) in 11 western States
without first submitting a review recommendation to the President or
the Congress (Count II).  Third, respondent asserted that petitioners
violated FLPMA by failing to provide an opportunity for public
participation in the "land use status" decisions (Count VII).  J.A.
15-17, 20-21.

   b. On December 4, 1985, the district court denied petitioners'
motion to dismiss for failure to join indispensable parties and
granted respondent's request for a preliminary injunction (Pet. App.
119a-136a).  On a motion for reconsideration, the court also rejected
MSLF's contention that respondent had not adequately alleged injury in
fact from petitioners' actions (id. at 137a-150a).  The court issued a
nationwide preliminary injunction, enjoining the government from
"(t)aking any action inconsistent with any withdrawal, classification,
or other designation governing the protection of lands in the public
domain that was in effect on January 1, 1981" (id. at 185a), thereby
freezing the status quo as of that date for at least 180 million acres
-- an area equal to about one-thirteenth of the land mass of all fifty
States.

   The injunction had sweeping implications.  In addition to halting
more than 260 agricultural entries, the injunction froze hundreds of
land transactions, including a land exchange between the Bureau and
the State of Arizona under which the federal government would have
obtained 500,000 acres of state land scattered throughout wilderness
study areas and desert bighorn sheep and riparian wildlife habitat
areas, in exchange for 150,000 acres of federal land (Martyak
Affidavit at 6-7;  C.A. App. 203-204);  revocation of a land
withdrawal that otherwise would have permitted the construction of a
power-generation dam in the Grand Canyon Recreation Area (Bibles
Affidavit and attached videotape);  and pending or proposed sales of
BLM lands near Las Vegas, Nevada, to generate money to permit the
Forest Service to purchase environmentally sensitive land in the Lake
Tahoe Basin.  See Collins Declaration at 1;  C.A. App. 227.  /11/

   Because of the extraordinary scope of the preliminary injunction,
the district court received numerous requests for exemptions during
the next several months.  The court soon found it necessary to modify
the preliminary injunction, ruling, in an order of February 10, 1986,
that the injunction did not directly enjoin the activities of third
parties (although the practical effect of the revised injunction was
to prohibit third-party activities on these lands in the many cases in
which the transaction had not been completed).  Pet. App. 145a.
Thereafter, in response to federal legislation enacted to revise the
court's injunction, the court approved additional amendments to its
injunctive order.  See, e.g., Order of Nov. 25, 1986 (Pet. App. 169a);
 Order of Apr. 8, 1988 (Pet. App. 160a-161a);  Act of Oct. 27, 1986,
Pub. L. No. 99-542, Section 3, 100 Stat. 3038-3039;  Wild and Scenic
Rivers Act, Amendments, Pub. L. No. 99-590, Section 104, 100 Stat.
3332;  act of Nov. 7, 1986, Pub. L. No. 99-632, Sections 4, 6-7, 100
Stat. 3520, 3521;  Act of Nov. 6, 1986, Pub. L. No. 99-606, Section
12(h), 100 Stat. 3467;  Federal Land Exchange Facilitation Act of
1988, Pub. L. No. 100-409, Section 10, 102 Stat. 1092-1093.  /12/
Indeed, in one instance, respondent itself sought an exemption from
the injunction for a land exchange that all viewed as environmentally
beneficial.  The court denied that request, without explanation (Order
of Apr. 30, 1986, entered May 5, 1986 (Pet. App. 174a-175a)).  /13/

   c. In May 1986, more than five months after the district court
issued its injunction, respondent submitted three affidavits of
members to support its standing to challenge the hundreds of land use
orders affecting the approximately 180,000,000 acres of public land.
The affidavit of Peggy Kay Peterson stated (Pet. App. 191a):

      My recreational use and aesthetic enjoyment of federal lands,
      particularly those in the vicinity of South Pass-Green Mountain,
      Wyoming have been and continue to be adversely affected in fact
      by the unlawful actions of the Bureau and the Department.  In
      particular, the South Pass-Green Mountain area of Wyoming has
      been opened up to the staking of mining claims and oil and gas
      leasing, an action which threatens the aesthetic beauty and
      wildlife habitat potential of these lands.

   The affidavit of Richard Loren Erman was virtually identical to the
Peterson affidavit, except that it alleged that Erman uses land "in
the vicinity of Grand Canyon National Park, the Arizona Strip (Kanab
Plateau) and the Kaibab National Forest" (Pet. App. 187a).  That area,
called the Arizona Strip, contains 5.5 million acres, one-eighth of
the State of Arizona.  Erman claimed injury from potential uranium
mining in that area allegedly made possible by Interior's action.

   Finally, in support of its claim of "informational standing,"
respondent submitted a declaration of a vice-president of the
organization, Lynn Greenwalt.  The Greenwalt declaration alleged
injury to the group's ability to acquire and disseminate information
on the public lands.  Pet. App. 193a-194a.

   2. a. The government and MSLF appealed, and a panel of the court of
appeals affirmed by a divided vote (Pet. App. 38a-115a).  In upholding
the preliminary injunction, the court concluded that respondent had
"alleged injury in fact sufficient to establish standing to pursue its
two FLPMA claims (Counts I and VII) against the Department." Id. at
56a.  The court noted that respondent had alleged that its members
regularly use the lands at issue (id. at 51a-52a), and it rejected the
contention that those allegations were insufficiently specific.  In
any event, the court stated (id. at 53a-54a):

         Even if this lack of specificity were somehow fatal to the
      complaint, it was cured by the affidavits of two Federation
      members filed with the district court after issuance of the
      preliminary injunction.  * * * These affidavits provide a
      concrete indication that the Federation's members use specific
      lands covered by the agency's Program and will be adversely
      affected by the agency's action.  Mountain States contends that
      even these affidavits are insufficient because the named members
      claim only to use resources in the "vicinity" of the land
      covered by the challenged withdrawal revocations.  The
      Federation's allegations in this regard however comport with
      those in (United States v. Students Challenging Regulatory
      Agency Procedures (SCRAP), 412 U.S. 669 (1973));  they therefore
      are sufficiently specific for purposes of a motion to dismiss.
      /14/

   Judge Williams concurred in the judgment on the standing issue, but
wrote separately "in the hopes of clarifying what a plaintiff must
show to meet the injury-in-fact component of standing when seeking a
preliminary injunction" (Pet. App. 85a-86a).  He stated that "NWF
challenges the legality of two programs -- classification terminations
and withdrawal revocations -- that affect over 180 million acres of
public lands" (id. at 86a).  He reasoned that standing principles
require that respondent (ibid.):

         (1) identify lands that are affected by each program;  (2)
      demonstrate that third parties are likely to respond to the
      regulatory changes with development activities;  and (3)
      identify activities of members in specific areas that would
      suffer an adverse impact from such third-party conduct.

Judge Williams concluded that while respondent had adequately
identified the land at issue, "(a)s to the other elements, NWF's
submissions were markedly defective" (id. at 89a).  In particular, he
explained, the allegations in the complaint were "too vague," as were
the assertions contained in respondent's affidavits (ibid.).  He
nevertheless concluded that the record "provides modest support for
the inference that some types of the disputed regulatory status
changes have a material likelihood of leading to development activity
potentially injurious to the activities of plaintiff's members on the
lands named in the affidavits" (id. at 90a).  /15/

   b. The government and MSLF thereafter filed petitions for
rehearing, and the panel denied the petitions in a per curiam
memorandum.  Pet. App. 116a-118a.  In doing so, however, the court
recognized that "some of the criticisms of the breadth and scope of
the preliminary injunction offered in the vigorous dissent are not
without force" (id. at 117a-118a).  It also acknowledged that "the
disposition of these millions of acres should not continue to rest any
longer than necessary on the foundation of a preliminary injunction
which was entered on consideration of the brief affidavits and cursory
materials presented to the court below" (id. at 118a).  The court
therefore "issue(d) its mandate forthwith with directions to the
parties and the district court to proceed with this litigation with
dispatch" (ibid.).

   3. a. In June 1986, prior to the court of appeals' decision
remanding the case, the government had served 16 notices of deposition
to discover the basis of respondent's allegations of standing.  The
following month, respondent filed a motion for summary judgment.  It
also moved, successfully, to preclude the government's request for
discovery on the standing issue, asserting that any such discovery
"would be unreasonably cumulative, duplicative, burdensome and
expensive" (Motion to Quash and for a Protective Order at 7;  Pet.
App. 170a).

   In support of a cross-motion for summary judgment, filed in
September 1986, the government submitted extensive affidavits
addressed to the question of standing.  For its part, respondent
continued to base its standing on the Peterson, Erman, and Greenwalt
affidavits, filing no additional affidavits within the time allotted
under Fed. R. Civ. P. 56.  At the close of a hearing on the motion in
July 1988, the district court requested supplemental briefing on the
question of NWF's standing.  In response to that request, respondent
submitted not only a legal memorandum, but also four new factual
affidavits.  The district court refused to consider those affidavits,
finding that they were "untimely and in violation of our Order" (Pet.
App. 28a-29a n.3).

   b. On November 4, 1988, the district court vacated the outstanding
preliminary injunction, granted the government's motion for summary
judgment, and dismissed the action for want of standing (Pet. App.
26a-37a).  The court explained that to establish its standing,
respondent was required to "plead and prove that it or its members
have suffered some actual or threatened injury as the result of
defendants' allegedly unlawful conduct" (id. at 31a).  The court found
that respondent had failed to meet that burden.  /16/

   The court first examined respondent's claim that the government had
not permitted sufficient public participation in its review process.
On that claim, the court noted, respondent based its standing on the
Greenwalt declaration, which simply stated that the Federation's
ability to meet its obligation to its members "has been significantly
impaired by the failure of the Bureau of Land Management and the
Department of the Interior to provide adequate information and public
participation with respect to the Land Withdrawal Review Program"
(Pet. App. 32a).  The court found that statement "conclusory and
completely devoid of specific facts" (ibid.), holding that it provided
"no basis to support (respondent's) claim of standing" (ibid.).  /17/

   The court turned next to respondent's claim of standing based on
alleged environmental harm to its members resulting from the
termination of classifications and the revocation of withdrawals.  The
court observed that respondent "rest(ed) its entire claim of standing
to sue for environmental injury on the affidavits of two persons,
i.e., Peggy Peterson and Richard Erman" (Pet. App. 34a), which "use
the same boiler plate language and format" (id. at 34a n.10).
Peterson's affidavit, the court stated, simply "claims that she uses
federal lands in the vicinity of the South Pass-Green Mountain area of
Wyoming for recreational purposes and for aesthetic enjoyment" and
that her enjoyment has been "adversely affected as the result of the
decision of the BLM to open it to the staking of mining claims and oil
and gas leasing" (id. at 34a-35a).  Based on the government's
affidavits, however, the court noted that 1,993,500 acres of the
2,000,000-acre South Pass-Green Mountain area (about 99.67%) had
always been open to mining and mineral leasing and that petitioners'
termination of the relevant classification opened up only an
additional 4,500 acres (.225%) of that area.  See id. at 35a.  The
court observed that Peterson's affidavit, which simply asserted that
"she uses lands 'in the vicinity'" of the 2,000,000-acre area, failed
to establish that her use "extend(ed) to the particular 4,500 acres
affected by the termination" (ibid.).

   The court concluded that the Erman affidavit was "similarly
flawed." Pet. App. 35a.  Erman, the court noted, asserted that he used
federal lands "in the vicinity" of the Grand Canyon National Park and
the Arizona Strip and that his enjoyment would be adversely affected
by the BLM's actions, "with particular reference to the opening to the
staking of mining claims" in that 5.5 million acre area, "an area
one-eighth the size of the State of Arizona" (id. at 35a-36a).  The
government's affidavits showed, however, that "virtually the entire
Strip is and for many years has been open to uranium and other
metalliferous mining" (id. at 36a), and that the "revocation of
withdrawal concerned only non-metalliferous mining in the western
one-third of the Arizona Strip, an area possessing no potential for
non-metalliferous mining" (ibid.).  The court concluded (id. at
36a-37a):

         Both the Peterson and Erman Affidavits are vague, conclusory
      and lack factual specificity.  They do not and cannot show
      "injury in fact" with respect to the two specific areas in
      Wyoming and Arizona in the vicinity of which these affiants
      claim to be located.  More important, standing alone, these two
      affidavits do not provide any basis for standing to challenge,
      as violative of the Federal Land Policy Management Act, the
      legality of each of the 1250 or so individual classification
      terminations and withdrawal revocations.  It should be noted
      that plaintiff's claims of injury reach hundreds of decisions
      affecting 180 million acres spread over seventeen states.  Since
      plaintiff lacks standing in the constitutional sense or as an
      "aggrieved party" under Section 702 of the APA, we lack subject
      matter jurisdiction and dismiss for lack of standing.  /18/

   4. The court of appeals reversed (Pet. App. 1a-25a).  The court
first ruled that the Peterson affidavit, by itself, sufficiently
established "injury-in-fact" to withstand summary judgment under the
APA and the Constitution (id. at 15a-16a).  The court acknowledged
that the affidavit did not state that Peterson had used the 4,500
acres in South Pass-Green Mountain that were actually opened to mining
and mineral leasing (id. at 16a-17a).  It reasoned, however, that (id.
at 17a):

      The language of Peterson's affidavit can be read to presume that
      the 4500 newly opened acres included the areas that Peterson
      uses;  otherwise her use and enjoyment would not be "adversely
      affected." * * * If Peterson was not referring to lands in this
      4500-acre affected area, her allegation of impairment to her use
      and enjoyment would be meaningless, or perjurious.  The District
      Court in no way questions the veracity or clarity of the
      affidavit, only its specificity.  * * * But the trial court
      overlooks the fact that unless Peterson's language is read to
      refer to the lands affected by the Program, the affidavit is, at
      best, a meaningless document.

The court added that, "(a)t a minimum," the affidavit is ambiguous,
and thus, on summary judgment, the district court should have resolved
that ambiguity in favor of the non-moving party, in this case the
respondent.  Ibid.  /19/

   The court of appeals also held that the law of the case doctrine
required a ruling on the standing question in respondent's favor.
Pet. App. 18a-20a.  The court noted that in affirming the preliminary
injunction issued by the district court, a previous panel had rejected
a challenge to respondent's standing.  Id. at 18a-19a.  The court
reasoned that since "the burden of establishing irreparable harm to
support a request for a preliminary injunction is, if anything, at
least as great as the burden of resisting a summary judgment motion"
(id. at 20a), the prior decision "upholding (respondent's) standing is
therefore the law of the case, which disposes of this appeal" (ibid.).

   Finally, the court found it "unfair and an abuse of discretion for
the trial court to refuse to consider the affidavits submitted by NWF
when the court asked for supplemental memoranda on the standing issue"
(Pet. App. 21a).  The court surmised that "(n)o party to this
litigation seriously disputes that NWF's supplemental affidavits, if
considered, easily satisfy the level of specificity needed for
standing under any of the Supreme Court's articulated tests" (ibid.).
In a footnote, the court further held that, having established its
standing to challenge one particular land action, respondent therefore
had standing to challenge all of the hundreds of different land
actions involved in the case.  Id. at 16a n.12.

   Having rejected petitioners' summary judgment challenge to
respondent's standing, the court directed the trial court, on remand,
to "address NWF's claims on the merits and fashion whatever relief it
deems appropriate" (Pet. App. 24a).  It "decline(d), however, to
reinstate the preliminary injunction because the case should now
proceed with dispatch" (id. at 25a).

                 INTRODUCTION AND SUMMARY OF ARGUMENT

   The decision of the court of appeals expands the standing doctrine
beyond meaningful limitation.  Departing from the already generous
standards articulated in United States v. Students Challenging
Regulatory Agency Procedures (SCRAP), 412 U.S. 669 (1973), and Sierra
Club v. Morton, 405 U.S. 727 (1972), the court below accepted a
single, vague allegation -- one member's use of land "in the vicinity
of" a 2,000,000-acre area -- as a sufficient basis for challenging
hundreds of separate land use and disposition decisions affecting some
180,000,000 acres of public land.  To do so, the court was constrained
to "presume" that the affiant intended to assert an interest in the
4,500 affected acres scattered within the 2,000,000-acre area --
although the affiant had never adverted to those lands, let alone
asserted a personal interest in them.

   The court's misapplication of standing principles would permit
respondent, and similar plaintiffs in the future, to petition federal
courts for far-reaching relief from injuries that they have not shown
any likelihood of suffering.  The decision would thus threaten to draw
the courts into disputes that lack "that concrete adverseness which
sharpens the presentation of issues upon which the court so largely
depends for illumination of difficult * * * questions." Baker v. Carr,
369 U.S. 186, 204 (1962).  And once drawn so comprehensively into the
fray, the courts would inevitably assume (as exemplified by the
nationwide preliminary injunction here) managerial responsibilities
for wide-ranging federal activities -- activities whose administration
properly belongs in the Executive Branch.

   I. To secure standing to sue, a party must allege and, if
challenged, prove that he has suffered a "distinct and palpable"
injury as a result of the challenged governmental action.  Gladstone,
Realtors v. Village of Bellwood, 441 U.S. 91, 100 (1979).  That
showing, moreover, "cannot be 'inferred argumentatively from averments
in the pleadings,' * * * but rather 'must affirmatively appear in the
record.'" FW/PBS, Inc. v. City of Dallas, 110 S. Ct. 596, 608 (1990).
The Peterson affidavit satisfies neither those prerequisites.
Peterson's allegation of injury, involving use of land "in the
vicinity" of a 2,000,000-acre parcel, is too remote from the
particular 4,500 scattered acres actually affected by the challenged
land use action.  Still more remote -- indeed, non-existent -- is any
showing of Peterson's connection to the 178,000,000 remaining acres,
outside the Green Mountain/South Pass region.

   The court of appeals' effort to resuscitate Peterson's affidavit --
by "presuming" that she had in mind the particular 4,500 affected
acres -- is fundamentally flawed.  At bottom, the court's approach
imputes to Peterson assertions that she did not, and perhaps could
not, make on her own.  The court of appeals had no warrant for
presuming facts never proved.  As this Court has recently reiterated,
"it is the burden of the 'party who seeks the exercise of jurisdiction
in his favor' * * * 'clearly to allege facts demonstrating that he is
a proper party to invoke judicial resolution of the dispute.'" FW/PBS,
Inc., 110 S. Ct. at 608.  And respondent was never required to prove,
when challenged, the facts establishing its standing.

   II. In granting summary judgment in this case, the district court
resolved two other issues in the government's favor.  First, the court
refused to permit respondent to supplement the record by submitting
new factual affidavits after the close of the summary judgment hearing
(see Pet. App. 28a-29a n.3).  Second, the court found that the
Greenwalt affidavit, submitted in support of respondent's
"informational standing" claim, was legally insufficient, in that it
was "conclusory and completely devoid of specific facts" (id. at 32a).
 The district court resolved both issues correctly.

   A. Although it had repeated opportunities over nearly two years to
supplement the factual record, respondent rested steadfastly on the
Peterson, Erman, and Greenwalt affidavits.  Indeed, respondent
resisted the government's effort to secure discovery on the standing
issue, contending that further inquiry "would be unreasonably
cumulative, duplicative, burdensome and expensive" (Motion to Quash
and for a Protective Order at 7;  Pet. App. 170a).  Even after the
government filed its summary judgment motion on standing grounds,
respondent submitted no additional evidence to the court.  Only after
the conclusion of the hearing on summary judgment, when the district
court asked for additional legal memoranda, did respondent change its
tune.  Along with the requested memorandum, respondent submitted new
affidavits, but offered no excuse for the tardy submission.  Under
those circumstances, the trial court acted wholly within its
discretion in rejecting the offerings.

   B. The district court was also correct in finding the Greenwalt
declaration legally insufficient.  That declaration -- submitted in
support of respondent's "informational standing" claim -- asserted
simply that respondent's ability to pursue its programs had been
"significantly impaired by the failure of the Bureau of Land
Management and the Department of the Interior to provide adequate
information and opportunities for public participation with respect to
the Land Withdrawal Review Program" (Pet. App. 194a).  The declaration
did not identify particular information that respondent had been
denied.  Indeed, the declaration did not allege that respondent had
even sought particular information, or had attempted without success
to participate in the decision-making process that culminated in the
challenged decisions.  In the absence of such allegations, the
Greenwalt declaration was insufficient to confer standing to sue.

   In sum, having correctly concluded that respondent had wholly
failed to establish its standing to sue, the district court properly
granted summary judgment in favor of petitioners.

                               ARGUMENT

   I. THE ALLEGATIONS CONTAINED IN THE PETERSON AFFIDAVIT ARE
INSUFFICIENT TO CONFER STANDING ON RESPONDENT TO SUE

   A. To Secure Standing To Sue, A Plaintiff Must Clearly Allege A
Distinct and Palpable Injury Resulting From The Challenged Action

   1. Article III of the Constitution limits the judicial power to
"Cases (and) Controversies(.)" To establish standing under Article
III, a plaintiff must allege a personal injury that is fairly
traceable to the defendant's challenged conduct and that is likely to
be redressed by the relief sought.  Allen v. Wright, 468 U.S. 737, 751
(1984);  Valley Forge Christian College v. Americans United for
Separation of Church & State, Inc., 454 U.S. 464, 472 (1982).  The
injury cannot be an "abstract" or "hypothetical" one (O'Shea v.
Littleton, 414 U.S. 488, 494 (1974);  City of Los Angeles v. Lyons,
461 U.S. 95, 101-102 (1983));  it must be "distinct and palpable"
(Gladstone, Realtors v. Village of Bellwood, 441 U.S. 91, 100 (1979)).
 And the claimed injury must ordinarily affect the party himself, not
someone else:  "the party who invokes the court's authority" must
"show that he personally has suffered some actual or threatened injury
as a result of the putatively illegal conduct of the defendant."
Valley Forge Christian College, 454 U.S. at 472 (emphasis added).
Only by identifying a concrete injury-in-fact can a plaintiff
"'allege() such a personal stake in the outcome of the controversy' as
to warrant his invocation of federal-court jurisdiction and to justify
exercise of the court's remedial powers on his behalf." Warth v.
Seldin, 422 U.S. 490, 498-499 (1975) (quoting Baker v. Carr, 369 U.S.
186, 204 (1962)).

   The Administrative Procedure Act, 5 U.S.C. 702, under which this
suit was filed, complements Article III standing by limiting
challenges to parties who are "adversely affected or aggrieved" by a
governmental action.  Under Section 702, the Court has required
plaintiffs to show that they are personally injured and that their
injury is caused by the challenged action.  See, e.g., Valley Forge
Christian College, 454 U.S. at 472, 487-488 n.24;  Simon v. Eastern
Kentucky Welfare Rights Org., 426 U.S. 26, 38-39 (1976);  Sierra Club
v. Morton, 405 U.S. 727, 732-733 & n.3 (1972).  /20/

   To be sure, the Court's decisions in Sierra Club v. Morton, 405
U.S. 727 (1972), and United States v. Students Challenging Regulatory
Agency Procedures (SCRAP), 412 U.S. 669 (1973), on which the court of
appeals relied (Pet. App. 14a-15a, 17a), took a somewhat expansive
view of standing.  But in both cases the Court nonetheless insisted
upon a clear showing of direct and personal injury.  Thus, in Sierra
Club, the Court held that the mere assertion that the Club had "a
special interest in the conservation and the sound maintenance of the
national parks, game refuges and forests of the country" was not
enough to confer standing.  405 U.S. at 730.  Because the Sierra Club
had failed to allege any individualized interest in the specific lands
in dispute, the Court rejected its standing claim.  Id. at 734-735.
Similarly, in the SCRAP case, in which the Court upheld the
plaintiffs' standing, the Court emphasized that the plaintiffs had
specifically claimed that their members "used the forests, streams,
mountains, and other resources in the Washington metropolitan area"
(412 U.S. at 685) -- resources which, according to the allegations in
the complaint, would be "directly harm(ed)" by the challenged
government action (id. at 687).  The Court explained that the
plaintiffs had thereby "alleged a specific and perceptible harm that
distinguished them from other citizens who had not used the natural
resources that were claimed to be affected" (id. at 689).

   2. At the summary judgment stage of a litigation, a plaintiff may
not rest on mere allegations, but must furnish sufficient proof of the
injuries attributable to the defendant's actions.  "For purposes of
ruling on a motion to dismiss for want of standing," the Court has
explained, "both the trial and reviewing courts must accept as true
all material allegations of the complaint, and must construe the
complaint in favor of the complaining party." Warth v. Seldin, 422
U.S. 490, 501 (1975).  Accord Pennell v. City of San Jose, 485 U.S. 1,
7 (1988).  Thereafter, however, the party invoking the court's
jurisdiction may be required to furnish "by affidavits, further
particularized allegations of fact deemed supportive of (its)
standing." Warth, 422 U.S. at 501.  At that point, "the allegations
must be true and capable of proof at trial." SCRAP, 412 U.S. at 689.
And if, having supplemented its pleadings with affidavits and further
proof, "the plaintiff's standing does not adequately appear from all
materials of record, the complaint must be dismissed." Warth, 422 U.S.
at 502.

   It is not sufficient, therefore, for a party simply to suggest a
distinct and palpable injury -- it must, instead, demonstrate that
injury clearly, and do so on the face of the record.  "It is a
long-settled principle that standing cannot be 'inferred
argumentatively from averments in the pleadings,' * * * but rather
'must affirmatively appear in the record.'" FW/PBS, Inc. v. City of
Dallas, 110 S. Ct. 596, 608 (1990).  Accord Bender v. Williamsport
Area School Dist., 475 U.S. 534, 546 & n.8 (1986).

   This Court's recent decision in FW/PBS, Inc., illustrates the
specificity with which a party must establish its standing to sue.
Plaintiffs in that case sought to enjoin the enforcement of a city
ordinance regulating the issuance of licenses to operate "sexually
oriented businesses." One of the provisions at issue denied licenses
to persons who had been convicted of two or more enumerated
misdemeanors within a 24-month period;  that disability lasted for
five years from the date of the last conviction or from release from
confinement, whichever was later.  Among the plaintiffs was Bill
Staten, who alleged in his affidavit that he had been convicted of
three enumerated misdemeanors within a 24-month period.  Staten
failed, however, "to state when he had been convicted of the last
misdemeanor or the date of release from confinement" (110 S. Ct. at
609).  Accordingly, the Court explained, Staten "failed 'clearly to
allege facts demonstrating that he is a proper party' to challenge the
civil disability provisions." Ibid.  Because "(n)o other petitioners
ha(d) alleged facts to establish standing and the District Court (had)
made no factual findings that could support standing" (ibid.), the
Court held that petitioners could not challenge the civil disability
provisions of the ordinance.  The Court certainly did not "presume"
that Staten's last conviction or release from confinement fell within
the last five years, simply because he had alleged standing to
challenge the ordinance.

   B. Under The Governing Standards, Respondent Cannot Predicate
Standing To Sue On The Allegations Contained In The Peterson Affidavit

   1. Respondent has not made a sufficient showing of standing in the
present case.  The single affidavit on which the court of appeals
relied -- the Peterson affidavit -- stated only that a single member
uses land "in the vicinity of" a 2,000,000-acre area.  That area,
which is nearly three times larger than the State of Rhode Island,
contains, scattered within it, no more than 4,500 acres of land (.225%
of the total) affected by the challenged land status actions in this
case.  Nothing in the Peterson affidavit suggests that the affiant has
any connection with the affected lands -- it states merely that she
uses and enjoys land "in the vicinity of" the millions of acres that
surround them.  And "vicinity" could mean Fremont and Natrona
Counties, Wyoming (generally the area embraced by Classification
W-6228);  or all of central Wyoming;  or, for all we know, anywhere in
"the West." In short, unlike the plaintiffs in SCRAP, respondent has
not shown "a specific and perceptible harm that distinguishe(s) (it)
from other citizens who ha(ve) not used the natural resources that
were claimed to be affected" (412 U.S. at 689).

   In granting summary judgment on the record before it, the district
court correctly concluded that respondent's proof of standing was
"vague, conclusory, and lack(ing) (in) factual specificity." Pet. App.
36a.  /21/ The court of appeals held otherwise only by "presum(ing)"
language that the affidavit simply does not contain.  In the court's
view, "(t)he language of Peterson's affidavit can be read to presume
that the 4500 newly opened acres included the areas that Peterson
uses;  otherwise, her use and enjoyment would not be 'adversely
affected.'" Id. at 17a.  But the court's reasoning is exactly
backwards;  it "presume(d)" the requisite showing of standing because,
had it not done so, respondent's standing claim "would be meaningless,
or perjurious" (ibid.).

   The court's presumption -- that a mere claim of standing
necessarily implies a factual basis to support it -- wholly nullifies
the standing requirement.  It is precisely because Peterson did not
demonstrate any use of, or other interest in, the affected land that
respondent lacks standing to challenge the government's actions.  The
court below had no warrant for imputing to the affiant statements that
she did not -- and perhaps could not -- make on her own.

   This Court's cases do not countenance the use of free-floating
presumptions to do the work that parties have not done for themselves.
 To the contrary, as the Court explained most recently, the "facts
supporting Article III jurisdiction must 'appea(r) affirmatively from
the record.'" FW/PBS, Inc., 110 S. Ct. at 608.  The Court's decision
in Grace v. American Central Insurance Co., 109 U.S. 278 (1883),
illustrates that point in a closely related setting.  The defendant in
Grace, having been sued on an insurance contract, removed the case to
federal court.  In its removal petition, the defendant alleged that
plaintiffs resided and were doing business in New York;  the record
did not, however, expressly show whether plaintiffs were citizens of
New York, and the Court therefore reversed the judgment for want of
diversity jurisdiction.  In doing so, the Court acknowledged that the
defendant's removal petition had asserted "that there is, and was at
the time when this action was brought, a controversy therein between
citizens of different States." Id. at 284.  But that assertion, the
Court held, was nothing more than an "unauthorized conclusion of law
which the petitioner (drew) from the facts previously averred." Ibid.
The Court refused to draw the same inference in the absence of an
explicit showing.  Because the jurisdiction of a federal court is
limited, the Court explained, "the presumption is that a cause is
without its jurisdiction unless the contrary affirmatively appears."
Id. at 283.  The requisite showing of jurisdiction, the Court stated,
may not simply "be inferred argumentatively from averments in the
pleadings." Id. at 284.  Rather, the Court observed, "the averments
should be positive." Ibid.  /22/

   The statements in the Peterson affidavit were anything but
"positive." Like the defendant in Grace, Peterson alleged that she
possessed a sufficient Article III interest, but she did not support
that allegation with evidence "distinctly and positively averred in
the pleadings" (109 U.S. at 284).  The court of appeals was therefore
left to "infer()" Peterson's standing "argumentatively from averments
in the pleadings" (ibid.).  Unhappily, the court below embarked upon
just that task -- "presuming" the missing statements of fact, and
thereby drawing the same "unauthorized conclusion of law" (ibid.)
renounced by the Court in Grace.  /23/

   The federal courts are not commissioned to do that much work for
the parties.  Under Article III, "it is the burden of the 'party who
seeks the exercise of jurisdiction in his favor' * * * clearly" to
demonstrate "that he is a proper party to invoke judicial resolution
of the dispute." FW/PBS, Inc., 110 S. Ct. at 608.  Peterson did not
carry that burden, and the court of appeals was not entitled to
shoulder the burden for her.  /24/

   2. Having "presumed" Peterson's connection to the 2,000,000-acre
parcel in Green Mountain/South Pass, the court of appeals then
compounded its error, many times over.  The court held (Pet. App. 16a
n.12) that respondent has standing to challenge actions affecting not
only the 2,000,000-acre parcel identified in the affidavit, but also
the remaining 178,000,000 acres of public lands whose status is in
dispute.

   Traditional standing principles cannot accommodate that judgment.
Peterson claimed only a remote connection to the 4,500 affected acres
in the Green Mountain/South Pass region, and her affidavit provides
nothing further to connect her (or the organization representing her)
to the remainder of the public land at issue.  Indeed, a nexus is not
even alleged, let alone substantiated.  Accordingly, Peterson's stake
in that remaining land "amounts only to a generalized grievance shared
by a large number of citizens in a substantially equal measure." Duke
Power Co. v. Carolina Environmental Study Group, Inc., 438 U.S. 59, 80
(1978).  And as the Court explained in Ex parte Levitt, 302 U.S. 633,
634 (1937), "(i)t is an established principle that to entitle a
private individual to invoke the judicial power to determine the
validity of executive or legislative action * * * it is not sufficient
that he has merely a general interest common to all members of the
public." Accord Warth, 422 U.S. at 499;  Schlesinger v. Reservists
Committee To Stop The War, 418 U.S. 208, 220 (1974).  /25/

   This extraordinarily far-reaching litigation -- which has already
produced a sweeping, nationwide preliminary injunction -- has thus
been premised on nothing more than a simple allegation of use of land
"in the vicinity" of Green Mountain/South Pass.  Indeed, as we have
noted (supra, p. 11), the terminations and revocations at issue in
this case vary considerably -- including such disparate orders as a
relinquishment from the Coast Guard of 11 acres previously reserved
for lighthouse purposes, and the abandonment by the Army of thousands
of acres that were no longer needed for weapons testing.  The sharply
different circumstances of the hundreds of separate orders challenged
by respondent suggest that this case would not be appropriate for
associational standing (particularly, standing to assert challenges on
a blunderbuss, wholesale basis), even if the supporting affidavits
from three of respondent's members were not otherwise deficient.  See
Hunt v. Washington State Apple Advertising Comm'n, 432 U.S. 333, 343
(1977).

   On the basis of the modest claim contained in her affidavit,
Peterson was "presumed" to use the 4,500 affected acres scattered
within the 2,000,000 acres that make up the region.  And with that
toehold interest alone, Peterson was then permitted to challenge
(through respondent) a broad category of governmental decisions
affecting an additional 178,000,000 acres of land throughout the
Nation.  Even if not itself flawed, the court of appeals' initial
presumption would not justify so far-reaching an exercise of judicial
power.  A federal court, in resolving a dispute properly before it,
may, of course, articulate a ratio decidendi that would have
precedential implications for similar disputes.  But it must be
content to allow a subsequent court, before which a similar dispute
arises, to determine whether it finds that precedent persuasive.  It
is not consistent with the judicial role under Article III for the
initial court to seek to pretermit the future resolution of similar
disputes by expanding the standing of the parties before it to reach
beyond the particular interests they have shown.  /26/ Cf. United
States v. Mendoza, 464 U.S. 154 (1984) (nonparty to prior lawsuit may
not use "offensive" collateral estoppel against the government).

   In sum, neither the toehold interest itself, nor the expanded scope
of the litigation based on that asserted toehold, was founded on an
adequate showing of standing in this case.

   C. The Court of Appeals' Misapplication Of Standing Principles
Implicates Serious Separation-of-Powers Concerns

   1. Standing requirements take on added significance when an
exercise of judicial power would "affect() relationships between
coequal arms of the National Government," because "(r)epeated and
essentially head-on confrontations between the life-tenured branch and
the representative branches of government will not, in the long run,
be beneficial to either" (Valley Forge Christian College, 454 U.S. at
473-474) (quoting United States v. Richardson, 418 U.S. 166, 188
(1974) (Powell, J., concurring)).  Indeed, the standing requirements
themselves arise out of a "single basic idea -- the idea of separation
of powers" (Allen v. Wright, 468 U.S. at 752) -- in that they
demarcate fundamental limits on the role of the federal courts in our
tripartite system of government.  Departures from the principles
governing standing may, therefore, rupture those limits.  "Relaxation
of standing requirements is directly related to the expansion of
judicial power" (Richardson, 418 U.S. at 188 (Powell, J.,
concurring)), and such relaxation may bring into court "generalized
grievances more appropriately addressed in the representative
branches" (Allen, 468 U.S. at 751).

   2. The present case conspicuously illustrates the
separation-of-powers concerns implicated by a basic misapplication of
standing principles.  Indeed, the very scope of the litigation
reflects its lack of Article III moorings.  Early on, the district
court entered, and the court of appeals sustained, a preliminary
injunction freezing -- for nearly three years -- the status of almost
180 million acres of public land.  That acreage amounts to
approximately 281,000 square miles, a size exceeding that of all the
States on the eastern seaboard from North Carolina to Maine.  In
addition to halting more than 260 agricultural entries, the injunction
froze hundreds of land sales and exchanges, including at least one
transfer that even respondent acknowledged to be environmentally
beneficial.  See pp. 14-15, supra.  And in administering that massive
injunction, the district court was required to assume the role of a
nationwide land use czar -- fielding an array of conflicting claims
for exemptions, granting some, while rejecting others.  See pp. 14-15
& nn.12, 13, supra.

   But even without the injunction in place (for now), the litigation
is overwhelming.  If remanded for trial, the case will require the
district court to review administrative records relating to the
hundreds of individual land decisions challenged by respondent, and to
determine in each instance whether the land use plan on which
petitioners relied satisfied the prerequisites of FLPMA.  Managing a
litigation of such dimension aggregates expansive powers in the court,
and withdraws them, correspondingly, from the executive officials
charged by law with the day-to-day responsibility for administering
the public lands.  The result, in this case, is a lawsuit seeking
judicial supervision of the Secretary's entire administration,
throughout the Nation, of his duties under FLPMA.

   Standing doctrines are designed to avoid such clashes between
judicial and executive authority.  Under our constitutional system,
the judicial power may be invoked to resolve controversies between
persons adversely affected by a particular governmental action and the
officials who took that action, not to supervise public officials'
general conduct of their duties.  In this case, the failure of the
district court (at first) and the court of appeals (throughout) to
adhere to this basic precept of judicial power under Article III has
led to "adjudication in a vacuum" (Pet. App. 105a) -- a vacuum in
which the court imposed massive injunctive relief, controlling a huge
amount of public land and unrepresented third parties, without any
showing of threat of injury-in-fact to respondent or any of its
members.  The court of appeals has now ordered this massive case to
proceed to trial on the same flawed premise.  /27/

   II. THE DISTRICT COURT CORRECTLY ENTERED SUMMARY JUDGMENT AGAINST
RESPONDENT FOR LACK OF STANDING IN THIS CASE

   In granting summary judgment in this case, the district court
resolved two other issues in the government's favor.  First, the court
refused to permit respondent to supplement the record by submitting
new factual affidavits after the close of the summary judgment hearing
(see Pet. App. 28a-29a n.3).  Second, the court found that the
Greenwalt declaration, submitted in support of respondent's
"informational standing" claim, was legally insufficient, in that it
was "conclusory and completely devoid of specific facts" (id. at 32a).
 In reversing, the court of appeals held that the refusal to accept
the supplemental affidavits was "unfair and an abuse of discretion"
(id. at 21a).  The court did not address the sufficiency of the
Greenwalt declaration (see id. at 18a n.13).  In our view, the trial
court resolved both issues correctly.  /28/

   A. The District Court Did Not Abuse Its Discretion In Refusing To
Permit Respondents To File Supplemental Affidavits Addressed To The
Question Of Standing

   Subject to the dictates of Fed. R. Civ. P. 56, the trial courts
have broad authority to manage summary judgment proceedings in pending
litigation.  /29/ More particularly, the decision whether or not to
permit a litigant to supplement the record in a summary judgment
proceeding is committed to the trial court's discretion.  "Absent an
affirmative showing by the non-moving party of excusable neglect * *
*, a court does not abuse its discretion in refusing to accept
out-of-time affidavits." Clinkscales v. Chevron U.S.A., Inc., 831 F.2d
1565, 1568 (11th Cir. 1987).  See also Farina v. Mission Investment
Trust, 615 F.2d 1068, 1076 (5th Cir. 1980);  Beaufort Concrete Co. v.
Atlantic States Constr. Co., 352 F.2d 460, 462-463 (5th Cir. 1965),
cert. denied, 384 U.S. 1004 (1966).

   Exercising that discretion in the present case, the district court
rejected respondent's submission of the supplemental affidavits as
untimely.  Its decision was not an abuse of discretion.  Despite
repeated opportunities to offer new evidence, respondent steadfastly
refused to supplement the record.  Indeed, respondent had earlier
resisted the government's effort to secure discovery on the standing
issue, contending that further inquiry "would be unreasonably
cumulative, duplicative, burdensome and expensive" (Motion to Quash
and for a Protective Order at 7;  Pet. App. 170a).  Even after the
government filed its summary judgment motion on standing grounds,
respondent submitted no additional evidence to the court.

   There is nothing "unfair" about respondent's predicament (see Pet.
App. 21a).  The government highlighted the insufficiency of the first
three affidavits in a summary judgment motion devoted exclusively to
standing.  Respondent filed a response -- but no new evidentiary
materials -- and thereafter let nearly two years go by.  Only after
the conclusion of the hearing on summary judgment, when the district
court asked for additional legal memoranda, did respondent change its
tune.  Along with the requested memorandum, respondent submitted new
affidavits, but offered no excuse for the tardy submission.

   In these circumstances, the trial court acted entirely within its
discretion in rejecting the offerings.  The court of appeals' contrary
conclusion should be reversed.  /30/

   B. The District Court Correctly Held That Respondent's Allegations
Of "Informational Standing" Were Insufficient

   Apart from claiming standing on behalf of its members, respondent
also submitted a single declaration in support of the organization's
standing in its own right, alleging injury to its ability to obtain
and disseminate information crucial to the organization's mission.
That declaration (Greenwalt Declaration, Pet. App. 193a-194a)
described the organization's activities, and asserted that its ability
to pursue its programs had been "significantly impaired by the failure
of the Bureau of Land Management and the Department of the Interior to
provide adequate information and opportunities for public
participation with respect to the Land Withdrawal Review Program." Id.
at 194a.  The declaration provided no further details about the source
or extent of respondent's injury.

   It is well settled that an affidavit that "contains only conclusory
allegations, not backed up by statements of fact, * * * cannot defeat
a motion for summary judgment." Shane v. Greyhound Lines, Inc., 868
F.2d 1057, 1061 (9th Cir. 1989).  "Mere conclusory statements * * * do
not take on dignity by placing them in affidavit form." Sweats
Fashions, Inc. v. Pannill Knitting Co., 833 F.2d 1560, 1564 (Fed. Cir.
1987).  Applying those principles, the district court concluded that
the Greenwalt declaration's "bare claim" of injury was "conclusory and
completely devoid of specific facts." Pet. App. 32a.  Noting that
respondent had the burden to make a showing as to each essential
element of its case, the district court held, under Celotex Corp. v.
Catrett, 477 U.S. 317 (1986), that respondent had failed to meet its
burden to show that it had been deprived of any information.  /31/

   That conclusion was plainly correct.  /32/ The assertions contained
in the Greenwalt declaration were insufficient to establish any injury
to respondent's ability to gather or disseminate information.  Like
the Peterson affidavit, Greenwalt's declaration required, but omitted,
crucial links in its chain of assertions.  Although the declaration
claimed that the government had failed to provide sufficient
information about the review of classifications and withdrawals, it
did not allege that BLM had withheld any particular information from
respondent, or that the agency had denied respondent an opportunity to
participate in the decisionmaking process.  Indeed, the record would
not bear out any such allegations:  all of the pertinent evidence
shows that BLM made its land status determinations, and all of the
information leading up to them, fully available to the public, and
that the agency consistently invited public participation.  If
respondent somehow overlooked that information, it has no one but
itself to blame;  indeed, even when the "extensive files" (Pet. App.
32a n.8) concerning each of these decisions were made available to
respondent during the course of the litigation, no representative from
the organization ever looked at them.  July 22, 1988 Motions Hearing
Tr. 49-50.

   It may be that respondent could have proven an injury to its
ability to gather or disseminate information (although we doubt it).
The fact remains, however, that respondent did not even assert that it
had tried to obtain information but was turned away, or that it had
sought to participate in the decisionmaking process but was denied
access.  Having failed to make the requisite allegations, respondent
lacks standing to assert an information-based claim.  /33/ See Public
Citizen v. United States Dep't of Justice, 109 S. Ct. 2558, 2563
(1989) (plaintiffs had standing because they had "specifically
requested, and been refused" particular information from an American
Bar Association committee).  See also ibid. (noting that in cases
brought under the Freedom of Information Act, parties may secure
standing by showing that "they sought and were denied specific agency
records").

   Accordingly, respondent wholly failed to establish its standing to
sue, and the district court was therefore correct in awarding summary
judgment against respondent.

                              CONCLUSION

   The judgment of the court of appeals should be reversed.

   Respectfully submitted.

   JOHN G. ROBERTS, JR.

      Acting Solicitor General /34/

   RICHARD B. STEWART

      Assistant Attorney General

   LAWRENCE G. WALLACE

      Deputy Solicitor General

   LAWRENCE S. ROBBINS

      Assistant to the Solicitor General

   PETER R. STEENLAND, JR.

   ANNE S. ALMY

   FRED R. DISHEROON

   DAVID A. KUBICHEK

   VICKI L. PLAUT

      Attorneys

   MARCH 1990

   /1/ Although withdrawals occurred at the President's order as early
as the nineteenth century, the President first obtained specific
congressional authority to withdraw lands in the Pickett Act of 1910
(Act of June 25, 1910), ch. 421, 36 Stat. 847, repealed by the Federal
Land Policy and Management Act of 1976, Pub. L. No. 94-579, Section
704(a), 90 Stat. 2792.

   /2/ Under FLPMA Section 103(c), 43 U.S.C. 1702(c),

      The term "multiple use" means the management of the public lands
      and their various resource values so that they are utilized in
      the combination that will best meet the present and future needs
      of the American people;  making the most judicious use of the
      land for some or all of these resources or related services over
      areas large enough to provide sufficient latitude for periodic
      adjustments in use to conform to changing needs and conditions;
      the use of some land for less than all of the resources;  a
      combination of balanced and diverse resource uses that takes
      into account the long-term needs of future generations for
      renewable and nonrenewable resources, including, but not limited
      to, recreation, range, timber, minerals, watershed, wildlife and
      fish, and natural scenic, scientific, and historical values;
      and harmonious and coordinated management of the various
      resources without permanent impairment of the productivity of
      the land and the quality of the environment with consideration
      being given to the relative values of the resources and not
      necessarily to the combination of uses that will give the
      greatest economic return or the greatest unit output.

Section 103(h) defines "sustained yield" as "the achievement and
maintenance in perpetuity of a high-level annual or regular periodic
output of the various renewable resources of the public lands
consistent with multiple use." 43 U.S.C. 1702(h).

   /3/ In fact, FLPMA itself recognizes the existence of MFPs.
Section 202(d), 43 U.S.C. 1712(d) (discussing land use plans "in
effect on October 21, 1976").

   /4/ Withdrawal revocations, whether under Section 204(a) or Section
204(l) of FLPMA, are not subject to the land use planning process
required by Section 202(c) for classification review.  Compare 43
U.S.C. 1712(d) with 43 U.S.C. 1714(a).  Post-FLPMA changes in
withdrawal status were nonetheless effected in a manner consistent
with existing land use plans and were subject to extensive public
participation.

   /5/ The Unit Resource Analysis is contained in the record as
Exhibit 1 to the Kelly Affidavit, which was attached to the federal
defendant's Motion for Summary Judgment.

   /6/ That approach (known as "blinders-on") requires each resource
specialist to make recommendations for use of the area as if no other
resource existed.  The wildlife specialist thus develops objectives
and makes planning recommendations oriented solely to the maximum
enhancement of wildlife habitat.  The mineral and range management
specialists do likewise for their respective resources.  The purpose
of the approach is to develop a set of proposals that reflect the
optimum management possibility for each resource.  The approach also
ensures that when conflicts among resource objectives surface later in
the planning process, the decisionmaker will be assured of having
before him the full range of management options for each resource.
And if no conflicts emerge, the approach ensures that resources can be
managed at their optimum level.  J.A. 128.

   /7/ At each of those stages, but particularly before the MFP became
final, the public -- at the federal, state, and local level -- was
informed about the process and invited to review the plans and
proposals.  In 1977 and 1978, while the Unit Resource Analysis was in
preparation, BLM made approximately 80 contacts -- ranging from
telephone calls and personal interviews to group meetings and
workshops -- concerning the upcoming planning work for the area.  J.A.
127.  During each subsequent stage more contacts were made, including
meetings with the Green Mountain Monitoring Group, ranchers, the
Wyoming State Oil and Gas supervisors, and the Forest Service.  J.A.
129.  On July 30, 1979, BLM sent interested persons a letter enclosing
a discussion and brief explanation of the MFP proposals.  Ibid.  At
the public hearing held on August 22, 1979, a BLM official
specifically discussed the proposed review of the areas segregated
from mining by Classification W-6228.  J.A. 129-130.

   /8/ BLM has continued to reevaluate those decisions in the context
of ongoing land use planning.  In January 1984, BLM initiated a
Resource Management Plan for the entire Lander Resource area,
encompassing Green Mountain and South Pass.  49 Fed. Reg. 3,277-3,278.
 In 1985, the agency prepared a draft RMP/environmental impact
statement in which it discussed several options concerning the status
of the area.  J.A. 138.  The Lander RMP -- and all of the issues it
raises -- continue to be the subject of public meetings, hearings, and
open houses.  J.A. 138-139.

   /9/ BLM has undertaken all of its withdrawal revocations to date
pursuant to Section 204(a) of FLPMA.  No revocations pursuant to
Section 204(l) of the Act have yet been completed.

   /10/ The "record" required "clearing" in three principal respects.
First, some of the lands subject to withdrawal had previously been
transferred out of federal ownership.  Second, there were numerous
instances of overlapping withdrawals, which rendered one or more of
the withdrawals unnecessary.  Third, some of the withdrawals had been
superseded by Congress;  for example, Congress created a national park
on an area covered by a withdrawal.  In each of those cases, a
revocation of the existing withdrawal was required in order to
reconcile the public land records with the current status of the land.
 J.A. 143-144.

   /11/ Congress specifically authorized these transactions in the
Burton-Santini Act.  Burton-Santini Act, Pub. L. No. 96-586, 94 Stat.
3381 (1980).

   /12/ On the other hand, when the Trust for Public Land -- another
environmental organization -- sought to intervene in order to petition
the district court to exempt from the injunction a land exchange that
would have added 371 acres to various wilderness and forest lands, the
district court granted intervention but refused to permit the
exemption.  Order of Mar. 6, 1986 (Pet. App. 176a-177a).

   /13/ Similarly, in August 1986, the Department of Water and Power
for the City of Los Angeles, the California Energy Company, Inc., and
the County of Inyo, California, sought to intervene in the action to
seek exemptions from the preliminary injunction "for the limited
purpose of obtaining a declaration that Cal Energy's geothermal
operations on Naval Weapons Center lands * * * in the Coso Known
Geothermal Resource Area, Inyo, California, are not within the scope
of (the injunction)" or for an exemption for those operations.
Motions to Intervene, Docket Nos. 188-190.  The district court
ultimately issued an order interpreting its injunction to exclude
those operations, but denying a request to declare that a
congressionally approved exchange of the land on which those
operations are conducted is not within the scope of the injunction.
Orders of Jan. 6, 1987, and Dec. 31, 1986 (Pet. App. 165a-168a).

   /14/ The court also held that respondent had not failed to join
indispensable third parties or exhaust its administrative remedies,
and that the complaint was not barred by laches.  Pet. App. 57a-65a.

   /15/ Judge Williams dissented from the court's affirmance of the
preliminary injunction, concluding that respondent was not likely to
prevail on the merits, that it had failed to show a sufficient threat
of irreparable harm, and that the potential threat of harm to other
parties and to the public interest weighed against the issuance of an
injunction.  Pet. App. 99a-115a.

   /16/ The court noted that the previous rulings concerning standing
"arose in the posture of defendant's motion to dismiss, which affected
the degree of factual specificity required to be shown in order to
establish the likelihood of personal injury to plaintiff's members"
(Pet. App. 29a).  On a motion for summary judgment, it explained, a
court is entitled to reconsider a preliminary determination of
standing (id. at 30a).

   /17/ The court also noted that "(a)lthough not required to do so,
because defendants did not have the burden to disprove plaintiff's
conclusory contention, defendants have advised plaintiff of the
environmental documentation and the methodology employed and have made
its (sic) extensive files containing such information available for
plaintiff's inspection" (Pet. App. 32a n.8).

   /18/ In light of its standing decision, the district court found it
unnecessary to reach "the merits of plaintiff's claim for injunctive
relief" (Pet. App. 37a).  It noted, however, that Judge Williams'
dissenting opinion "mirrored many of the() problems in its discussion
of our grant of preliminary injunction" (ibid.).

   /19/ The court noted that since it found the Peterson affidavit
sufficient to survive summary judgment, it did not need to address the
sufficiency of the Greenwalt and Erman affidavits.  Pet. App. 18a
n.13.

   /20/ Section 702 also requires plaintiffs to show that "the
interest sought to be protected by the complainant is arguably within
the zone of interests to be protected or regulated by the statute or
constitutional guarantee in question." Clarke v. Securities Industry
Ass'n, 479 U.S. 388, 395-396 (1987) (quoting Association of Data
Processing Service Organizations, Inc. v. Camp, 397 U.S. 150, 153
(1970)).

   /21/ See Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, 477 U.S. 317, 322 (1986) ("the
plain language of Rule 56(c) mandates the entry of summary judgment *
* * against a party who fails to make a showing sufficient to
establish the existence of an element essential to that party's
case").

   /22/ Accord Bender v. Williampsortt Area School Dist., 475 U.S.
534, 546-547 (1986);  Thomas v. Board of Trustees, 195 U.S. 207, 210
(1904);  Mansfield, C.&L.M. Ry. v. Swan, 111 U.S. 379, 382 (1884).

   /23/ The court of appeals alternatively surmised that the Peterson
affidavit was, at worst, ambiguous, thereby preventing entry of
summary judgment.  Pet. App. 17a.  That conclusion was also wrong.
Ambiguity, without more, is not grounds for resisting summary
judgment.  To the contrary, under Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(e), it is up to
the non-moving party to "set forth specific facts showing there is a
genuine issue for trial." See Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477
U.S. 242, 250 (1986).  Respondent had ample opportunity prior to the
hearing to meet that burden, but failed to do so.

   /24/ Any number of this Court's cases could have been decided
differently if the plaintiffs in those cases had had at their disposal
the court of appeals' presumption.  In FW/PBS, Inc., supra, for
example, plaintiff Bill Staten asserted in his affidavit that because
of his three misdemeanor convictions within a 24-month period, he had
a "serious doubt that (he) would be able to obtain the requisite
licenses" (7 Record, Staten Affidavit at 2).  Following the approach
of the court below, Staten could have argued that, because he had
alleged a "serious doubt" about his licensing prospects, a court must
"presume" that Staten's last conviction (or release from confinement)
occurred within the last five years.  A similar device might have
availed the plaintiffs in Warth v. Seldin, supra, involving a
challenge to local zoning practices that allegedly deprived the
plaintiffs of affordable housing.  With the benefit of the court of
appeals' presumption, a court could have "presumed" from plaintiffs'
basic allegation -- that the zoning practices had excluded plaintiffs
from the housing market (see 422 U.S. at 503-504 & nn.13, 14) -- the
very facts that this Court found to be missing from the pleadings:
"facts from which it reasonably could be inferred that, absent the
respondents' restrictive zoning practices, there is a substantial
probability that they would have been able to purchase or lease" a
home (id. at 504).  In short, taken to the limits of its logic, the
court of appeals' "presumption" could transfigure established standing
doctrine, root and branch.

   /25/ The Peterson affidavit alleges no more "distinct and palpable"
stake in the land outside Wyoming than was the stake alleged by the
Sierra Club in Mineral King and Sequoia National Park.  See Sierra
Club v. Morton, 405 U.S. at 735.

   /26/ In authorizing judicial review at the behest of a person
"adversely affected or aggrieved by agency action," 5 U.S.C. 702, the
Administrative Procedure Act introduces no departure from this
fundamental principle.  Under that provision, a person aggrieved by a
particular governmental order affecting particular lands may challenge
that order in court.  The suit authorized by 5 U.S.C. 702 is directed
to the final "agency action" itself (embodied in that order);  that
provision does not authorize a more general judicial supervision of
the agency program or policy pursuant to which the particular order
(the "agency action") was adopted.

   /27/ Relying on "the same boiler plate language and format" (Pet.
App. 34a n.10) as the Peterson affidavit, the affidavit submitted by
Richard Loren Erman (id. at 187a-189a) alleged a use of federal lands
"in the vicinity" of the Grand Canyon National Park and the Arizona
Strip (id. at 187a) -- a 5.5 million-acre area, or about "one-eighth
the size of the State of Arizona" (id. at 36a).  Although the court of
appeals did not reach the issue (see Pet. App. 18a n.13), the district
court found the Erman allegations to be "vague, conclusory and
lack(ing) (in) factual specificity" (id. at 36a).  The district court
therefore held that the Erman affidavit was insufficient for standing
purposes.  For the reasons stated in point I, supra, with respect to
the Peterson affidavit, the district court was correct in finding the
Erman affidavit similarly wanting.

   /28/ In reversing the order granting summary judgment, the court of
appeals also held (Pet. App. 18a-20a) that the prior panel decision on
the appeal from the entry of the preliminary injunction constituted
the "law of the case" and therefore precluded reconsideration of
respondent's standing.  That holding, of course, does not affect this
Court's decision, since a reviewing court obviously is not bound by
the "law of the case" established by a lower court for purposes of its
own further decision.  Beyond that, the court of appeals' application
of the "law of the case" doctrine is deeply flawed.  First, a court is
always free (indeed, where necessary, required) to examine its own
jurisdiction, including a plaintiff's standing to commence an action.
See FW/PBS, Inc., 110 S. Ct. at 607-608.  Second, allegations of
injury that may be sufficient to survive a motion to dismiss or to
warrant a preliminary injunction may not be sufficient to withstand a
motion for summary judgment -- which will typically be made on a
fuller record, developed after more extensive discovery.  See
University of Texas v. Camenisch, 451 U.S. 390, 395 (1981);  United
States v. SCRAP, 412 U.S. at 689.  Indeed, notwithstanding the second
panel's determination (Pet. App. 19a-20a), the first panel decision in
this case recognized that very point, stating that the allegations in
the affidavit were "sufficiently specific for purposes of a motion to
dismiss" (id. at 54a (emphasis added)).  Finally, the earlier panel
decision, which was predicated on the same inadequate affidavits that
were before the court of appeals the second time around, is itself
mistaken for the same reasons we have explained above.

   /29/ See, e.g., Childers v. Joseph, 842 F.2d 689, 693-694 n.3 (3d
Cir. 1988);  Koplove v. Ford Motor Co., 795 F.2d 15, 18 (3d Cir.
1986);  Pasternak v. Lear Petroleum Exploration, Inc., 790 F.2d 828,
832-833 (10th Cir. 1986);  Anthony v. Baker, 767 F.2d 657, 666-667
(10th Cir. 1985);  Clark Equipment Credit Corp. v. Martin Lumber Co.,
731 F.2d 579, 581 (8th Cir. 1984).

   /30/ The court of appeals stated that "(n)o party to this
litigation seriously disputes that (respondent's) supplemental
affidavits, if considered, easily satisfy the level of specificity
needed for standing under any of the Supreme Court's articulated
tests." Pet. App. 21a.  In our appellate brief, however, we had
explicitly disputed the sufficiency of the supplemental affidavits.
See Gov't C.A. Br. 34.  Thus, even if the court of appeals had been
correct in concluding that the trial court abused its discretion in
refusing to consider the supplemental affidavits, we should have been
permitted, in a remand to the district court, to contest the
sufficiency and bona fides of the affidavits.

   /31/ The court further noted that although petitioners had no
"burden to disprove (respondent's) conclusory contention" on this
issue, petitioners had nevertheless "advised (respondent) of the
environmental documentations and the methodology employed," and had
made their "extensive files containing such information available for
(respondent's) inspection" (Pet. App. 32a n.8).

   /32/ Although the court of appeals did not address the sufficiency
of the Greenwalt declaration, the issue was resolved by the district
court and fully briefed on appeal by the parties.  See New York City
Transit Authority v. Beazer, 440 U.S. 568, 583-584 n.24 (1979).
Particularly where, as here, the issue is jurisdictional and the
"facts" underlying the jurisdictional dispute issue are
uncontroverted, this Court may reach the issue.  See FW/PBS, Inc. v.
City of Dallas, 110 S. Ct. at 607-608.

   /33/ While respondent's failure to substantiate its claim of injury
is thus dispositive, we note further the lack of legal foundation for
respondent's reliance on "informational standing" as a sufficient
basis for asserting its broad and far-reaching legal contentions in
this case.  Even the Freedom of Information Act, 5 U.S.C. 552, which
was enacted for the specific purpose of providing a right of access to
government information, does not require the government, in response
to information requests, to create documents that do not already
exist.  Kissinger v. Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, 445
U.S. 136, 152 (1980).  Far less does that Act authorize lawsuits to
interfere with the conduct of government activities while such
documents are created, or while existing government documents are
being compiled and disseminated.  Similarly, lawsuits to restrain
governmental action pending compliance with the requirements of
environmental statutes, such as the procedural requirements of NEPA,
have been founded on the plaintiff's showing of a requisite interest
in the particular governmental action at issue -- not merely a showing
of the plaintiff's desire for information or its wish to be heard.
See, e.g., SCRAP, 412 U.S. 669.

   /34/ The Solicitor General is disqualified in this case.