Opinion ID: 502245
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Adequacy of the Alleged Injuries

Text: 29 The Humane Society has alleged that allowing hunting on wildlife refuges injures its members in two respects. First, HSUS and its members have demonstrated a strong interest in the preservation, enhancement and humanitarian treatment of wildlife that the National Wildlife Refuge System was designed to protect. Second, [m]any HSUS members utilize the refuge system for recreational purposes, including the observation of wildlife protected by the refuges, and the killing and maiming of such wildlife severely impacts on these activities. Complaint of HSUS at p 5. The 18 affidavits of Humane Society members offered in support of these interests, see Joint Appendix (J.A.) at 142-98, lend credence to these organizational self-descriptions. 30 The first of these injuries, to members' strong interest in the enforcement of the Refuge and environmental laws, is an inadequate basis on which to ground standing. [A]n asserted right to have the government act in accordance with law is not sufficient, standing alone, to confer jurisdiction on a federal court. See Allen v. Wright, 468 U.S. 737, 754, 104 S.Ct. 3315, 3326, 82 L.Ed.2d 556 (1984); see also Schlesinger v. Reservists Committee to Stop the War, 418 U.S. 208, 222-23, 94 S.Ct. 2925, 2932-33, 41 L.Ed.2d 706 (1974) (rejecting claim of citizen standing and stating that [t]o permit a complainant who has no concrete injury to require a court to rule on important constitutional issues in the abstract would create the potential for abuse in the judicial process). Nor can the sincerity of Society members' commitment to the enforcement of laws protecting wildlife compensate for the lack of a concrete stake. [S]tanding is not measured by the intensity of the litigant's interest or the fervor of his advocacy. Valley Forge, 454 U.S. at 486, 102 S.Ct. at 766. As the Supreme Court reiterated only last Term: 31 'The exercise of judicial power ... can so profoundly affect the lives, liberty and property of those to whom it extends,' Valley Forge, 454 U.S. at 473 [102 S.Ct. at 759], that the decision to seek review must be placed 'in the hands of those who have a direct stake in the outcome.' Sierra Club v. Morton, 405 U.S. 727, 740 [92 S.Ct. 1361, 1369, 31 L.Ed.2d 636 (1972) ]. It is not to be placed in the hands of 'concerned bystanders,' who will use it simply as a 'vehicle for the vindication of value interest.' United States v. SCRAP, 412 U.S. 669, 687 [93 S.Ct. 2405, 2416, 37 L.Ed.2d 254] (1973). 32 Diamond v. Charles, 476 U.S. 54, 106 S.Ct. 1697, 1703, 90 L.Ed.2d 48 (1986) (citations abbreviated). We therefore agree with the district court that what it terms the mere emotional injuries in this case are noncognizable. 33 The second injury alleged by the Humane Society, however, is clearly cognizable. The gist of this grievance is that the existence of hunting on wildlife refuges forces Society members to witness animal corpses and environmental degradation, in addition to depleting the supply of animals and birds that refuge visitors seek to view. These are classic aesthetic interests, which have always enjoyed protection under standing analysis. 34 The leading case on the legitimacy of aesthetic injuries is Sierra Club, where the Supreme Court stated: Aesthetic and environmental well-being, like economic well-being, are important ingredients of the quality of life in our society, and the fact that particular environmental interests are shared by the many rather than the few does not make them less deserving of legal protection through the judicial process. 405 U.S. at 734, 92 S.Ct. at 1366. The Court subsequently reaffirmed this position in SCRAP. See 412 U.S. at 686, 93 S.Ct. at 2415. Our recent opinion in National Wildlife Federation v. Hodel, 839 F.2d 694 (D.C.Cir.1988), holding that a wildlife organization had standing to challenge Interior Department surface-mining regulations that allegedly threatened to degrade the environment, involved injuries strikingly analogous to those involved in this case: There the National Wildlife Federation's standing rested in part on the aesthetic injuries to those members who complained of viewing degraded landscapes, see id. at 704, 707, and passim, and here the Humane Society's standing similarly rests on the aesthetic injuries to members who complain of viewing the despoliation of animals. See also Alaska Fish & Wildlife Federation v. Dunkle, 829 F.2d 933, 937 (9th Cir.1987) (decrease in number of migratory birds has injured those who wish to hunt, photograph, observe, or carry out scientific studies). We therefore conclude that both HSUS and Kindler have pleaded aesthetic injuries sufficient to confer standing to challenge hunting on refuges.