Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/18pdf/17-71_omjp.pdf
Page Number: 11.0

8 

WEYERHAEUSER CO. v. UNITED STATES FISH AND 

WILDLIFE SERV.
 
Opinion of the Court 

n. 21. 

We  granted  certiorari  to  consider  two  questions:  (1) 
whether  “critical  habitat”  under  the  ESA  must  also  be 
habitat;  and  (2)  whether  a  federal  court  may  review  an 
agency decision not to exclude a certain area from critical 
habitat because of the economic impact of such a designa-
tion.  583 U. S. ___ (2018).1 

II
 
A 

Our  analysis  starts  with  the  phrase  “critical  habitat.” 
According to the ordinary understanding of how adjectives 
work, “critical habitat” must also be “habitat.”  Adjectives
modify  nouns—they  pick  out  a  subset  of  a  category  that
possesses  a  certain  quality.    It  follows  that  “critical  habi-
tat”  is  the  subset  of  “habitat”  that  is  “critical”  to  the  con-
servation of an endangered species.

Of  course,  “[s]tatutory  language  cannot  be  construed  in 
a  vacuum,”  Sturgeon  v.  Frost,  577  U. S.  ___,  ___  (2016) 
(slip op., at 12) (internal quotation marks omitted), and so
we  must  also  consider  “critical  habitat”  in  its  statutory 
context.  Section  4(a)(3)(A)(i),  which  the  lower  courts  did 
not  analyze,  is  the  sole  source  of  authority  for  critical-
habitat designations.  That provision states that when the
Secretary lists a species as endangered he must also “des-
ignate any habitat of such species which is then considered 
to  be  critical  habitat.”  16  U. S. C.  §1533(a)(3)(A)(i)  (em-

—————— 

1 Intervenor Center for Biological Diversity raises an additional ques-
tion in its brief, arguing that Weyerhaeuser lacks standing to challenge
the critical-habitat designation because it has not suffered an injury in 
fact.    We  agree  with  the  lower  courts  that  the  decrease  in  the  market 
value  of  Weyerhaeuser’s  land  as  a  result  of  the  designation  is  a  suffi-
ciently concrete injury for Article III purposes.  See Village of Euclid v. 
Ambler  Realty  Co.,  272  U. S.  365,  386  (1926)  (holding  that  a  zoning
ordinance  that  “greatly  . . . reduce[d]  the value  of  appellee’s  lands  and
destroy[ed] their marketability for industrial, commercial and residen-
tial uses” constituted a “present invasion of appellee’s property rights”).