Ruth Bader Ginsburg left an environmental legacy — Republicans could erase it
The death of United States Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg last week shook the country.
The death of United States Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg shook the country.
Over her 27-year tenure, Ginsburg penned 483 opinions in unwavering support of women’s rights and gender equality. But these protections aren’t all we stand to lose: The late justice was also a semi-reliable vote for the environment, and her replacement could damper environmental progress for decades to come.
“As much as people are talking about women’s rights and civil rights, environmental protection is very much in the balance at the Supreme Court,” said Maya van Rossum, director of the environmental nonprofit Delaware Riverkeeper Network, in an interview with StateImpact Pennsylvania. “I am very concerned that we are going to see a concerted effort at the highest level in the federal courts to roll back environmental protections, which would have a devastating effect on people’s lives and health.”
For decades, Ginsburg used the law to protect communities from pollution.
She helped keep air pollution from crossing state lines and toxic chemicals from entering waterways via groundwater. But most notably, she was part of the five-justice majority in Massachusetts v. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the Supreme Court’s first-ever ruling on climate change.
The decision solidified the EPA’s authority, through the Clean Air Act, to regulate car emissions. It also paved the way for federal regulations of carbon dioxide emissions in 2009, an effort led by the Obama administration. The Court unanimously doubled down on this ruling in 2011, when Ginsburg wrote the opinion stating that the EPA should control emissions, not states.
“The appropriate amount of regulation in a particular greenhouse gas producing sector requires informed assessment of competing interests,” she wrote. “The expert agency [EPA] is surely better equipped to do the job than federal judges, who lack the scientific, economic, and technological resources an agency can utilize in coping with issues of this order.”
But her legacy is complicated, too, because she tended to make decisions based on nuances of the law rather than what was always best for the planet, according to E&E News. Earlier this year, for example, Justices Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer joined a conservative majority to uphold the U.S. Forest Service permitting an $8 billion, 600-mile pipeline to cross under the Appalachian Trail.
To be clear, Ginsburg voted in more good legislation than bad, but now that she’s gone, the highest court in the U.S. may stall on climate legislation, just when we need it most.
This past weekend, Trump nominated Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court, setting off an unprecedented race to confirm her before Election Day. Barrett is staunchly conservative, and though her environmental record is mostly unknown, she’s likely to side with Trump’s other picks, who, together, could help him solidify a legacy of environmental deregulation.
Democrats face an uphill battle to delay the confirmation vote and would need the help of a few Senate republicans — but it’s not impossible. Ginsburg always had faith that justice would prevail in the end.
“Justices continue to think and can change,” she said in 2014. “So, I am ever hopeful that if the court has a blind spot today, its eyes will be open tomorrow.”
Still, one thing is abundantly clear: It’s not just women who have to vote like their rights depend on it; it’s every person who prefers the planet liveable.