Opinion ID: 182614
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 8

Heading: TWS Lacks Prudential Standing

Text: TWS rests its claims on the federal government's property rights. TWS does not assert a valid right to relief of its own. No provisionconstitutional or statutoryexpressly grants TWS a right to relief. TWS invokes the Supremacy Clause of the U.S. Constitution, FLPMA, 43 U.S.C. § 1712, the Wilderness Act, 16 U.S.C. §§ 1131-36, the National Park Service Organic Act, 16 U.S.C. § 1, and various regulations and agency decisions implementing the statutes. Aplt.App. 609-11. None of these provisions creates an express private cause of action. [2] See Alexander v. Sandoval, 532 U.S. 275, 286-87, 121 S.Ct. 1511, 149 L.Ed.2d 517 (2001). That leaves only the Supremacy Clause. See Edmondson, 594 F.3d at 756 n. 13; Qwest, 380 F.3d at 1266. Nonetheless, standing often turns on the nature and source of the claim asserted. Warth, 422 U.S. at 500, 95 S.Ct. 2197. In the context of prudential standing, the source of the plaintiff's claim to relief assumes critical importance. Id. TWS argues that it is not suing based on the legal rights of a third party, the federal government's property rights, but rather is working to protect its conservation interests. Aplee. Br. at 37. This is indistinguishable from TWS's argument for constitutional standing: that the County's actions affect organization members' conservation interests. Id. at 31-32. But a party's interest for the purposes of constitutional standing does not automatically confer prudential standing. Prudential standing imposes different demands than injury in fact. See, e.g., City of Los Angeles v. County of Kern, 581 F.3d 841, 848 (9th Cir.2009); MainStreet Org. of Realtors v. Calumet City, 505 F.3d 742, 745 (7th Cir.2007). A party may suffer a cognizable injury but still not possess a right to relief. For example, in Hackford v. Babbitt, the plaintiff alleged injury in the form of crop damage when the defendants diverted irrigation canals. 14 F.3d 1457, 1464 (10th Cir.1994). Although this court assumed that the plaintiff had met the constitutional requirements for standing, he lacked prudential standing because he had no right to manage the irrigation project. Id. at 1466. Its protests notwithstanding, TWS obviously seeks to enforce the federal government's property rights in the disputed rights of way. Its claims turn on the superiority of the federal government's property claim. If the County possesses valid R.S. 2477 rights of way in the roads, then its actions do not necessarily conflict with the BLM's management decisions. On the other hand, if the County does not possess rights of way in the roads, then the BLM's final decisions trump and invalidate the County's actions. This was the crux of TWS's motion for summary judgment: Kane County has notand cannotdemonstrate as a matter of law that the County can flout federal management plans and open roads on federal public land without first proving that it possesses rights-of-way to the alleged routes. Aplt. App. 1612. TWS seeks what it views as the enforcement of federal rights. TWS has taken sides in what is essentially a property dispute between two landowners, only one of which is represented (Kane County). But TWS lacks any independent property rights of its own. In that light, Judge McConnell's analogy is apt: Imagine that my next-door neighbor, who keeps his property neat and tidy, is faced with a competing claimant to the land, who is likely to allow the property to fill with weeds. I might very much hope my neighbor wins. My property values and aesthetic interests could seriously be affected. I may be impatient with my neighbor's inclination toward compromise and apparent disinclination to go to court. But no one would say I have standing to sue in defense of my neighbor's property rights. The Wilderness Society is in precisely that situation. Wilderness Soc'y, 581 F.3d at 1232 (McConnell, J., dissenting). The Supreme Court's reasons for the general rule against third-party standing counsel against TWS's standing in this case. We must hesitate before resolving a controversy . . . on the basis of the rights of third persons not parties to the litigation for two reasons. Singleton v. Wulff, 428 U.S. 106, 113, 96 S.Ct. 2868, 49 L.Ed.2d 826 (1976). First, the courts should not adjudicate such rights unnecessarily, and it may be that in fact the holders of those rights . . . do not wish to assert them . . . . Id. at 113-14, 96 S.Ct. 2868. BLM's absence from this case indicates that it does not wish to assert its rights against Kane County at this time or in this fashion. Second, third parties themselves usually will be the best proponents of their own rights. The courts depend on effective advocacy, and therefore should prefer to construe legal rights only when the most effective advocates of those rights are before them. Id. at 114, 96 S.Ct. 2868. Although this court has disagreed whether the federal government may adequately represent conservation groups' interests in R.S. 2477 quiet title cases, see Kane County, 597 F.3d at 1134 (summarizing San Juan County's various opinions), surely the federal government is the best advocate of its own interests. Sometimes a case may present countervailing considerations which may outweigh the concerns underlying the usual reluctance to exert judicial power when the plaintiff's claim to relief rests on the legal rights of third parties. Warth, 422 U.S. at 500-01, 95 S.Ct. 2197; see also Kowalski v. Tesmer, 543 U.S. 125, 129-30, 125 S.Ct. 564, 160 L.Ed.2d 519 (2004). No such considerations are present here. First, the federal government's property right is not inextricably bound up with the activity the litigant wishes to pursue like the cases in which the Supreme Court has recognized a doctor's ability to assert his patient's privacy rights because of their confidential relationship. Singleton, 428 U.S. at 114-15, 96 S.Ct. 2868 (citing Doe v. Bolton, 410 U.S. 179, 188-89, 93 S.Ct. 739, 35 L.Ed.2d 201 (1973); Eisenstadt v. Baird, 405 U.S. 438, 445-46, 92 S.Ct. 1029, 31 L.Ed.2d 349 (1972); Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479, 85 S.Ct. 1678, 14 L.Ed.2d 510 (1965)). Second, even where a close relationship exists between the litigant and the third party, some genuine obstacle to the third party asserting his own rights must exist. Id. at 116, 96 S.Ct. 2868. No apparent obstacles prevent the federal government from asserting its own rights against Kane County, as this court has already recognized. See Kane County, 597 F.3d at 1135. Thus, without any circumstances in favor of allowing TWS to assert the federal government's legal rights, TWS lacks prudential standing.