We are a nation of laws -- but we are also a nation with a constitution that provides institutions like our courts to use their common sense and their respect for decency and reverence for life to get back to fundamentals and set things right when the laws have made a mess of things. Once upon a time, the laws of this country made a mess of things in a piece of litigation centered on a pernicious project at the Storm King Mountain in the Hudson River valley of New York. A federal judge based his decision not on any existing law but on what he felt were basic constitutional principles related to the Doctrine of the Public Trust. I think it would hardly be an overstatement to assert that many of our current national environmental laws emerged from the scaffolding of this federal court ruling. I am no prophet, but I think it is entirely possible that a very fine federal judge in the Pacific Northwest will soon show this country the wonders that a decent ruling from a federal district judge can bring to bear. Who cares about the arcane minutae of specific laws! The situation in the Pacific Northwest is a disgrace to the fundamental decency of the Federal Republic and the American People. Maybe Judge Dwyer can show us the majesty of English Common Law.
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