Opinion ID: 419819
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Source of Kerr-McGee's Injury

Text: 16 Kerr-McGee has alleged no direct injury resulting from the federal recommendation. It admits that California retains ultimate control over the decision to redesignate Death Valley and that the direct source of its injury will be action or inaction by the state. 17 Instead, Kerr-McGee argues that the statute establishes a causal relationship between the recommendation and injurious action by California. It asserts that under section 164, the federal recommendation triggers state action on redesignation and makes redesignation's harmful effects inevitable. 18 It argues also that the recommendation is a statutory prerequisite to action by California, an interpretation accepted by the district court. If this is correct, the recommendation has harmed Kerr-McGee because it allows California to act when otherwise it could not. At oral argument, Interior conceded that if either the prerequisite or trigger interpretation of section 164(d) were correct, Kerr-McGee's injury would be sufficiently developed to warrant federal jurisdiction. 19 The question whether Kerr-McGee has been injured depends on the effect upon state proceedings of a federal recommendation under section 164(d). We must examine the statute and make a partial determination on the merits to decide whether we have jurisdiction. See American Civil Liberties Union v. F.C.C., 523 F.2d 1344, 1348 (9th Cir.1975) (examination of merits to determine injury in fact).