And now:Ish <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
From: "Peter W. Martin" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: LIIBULLETIN, Monday June 7 excerpt
Date: Mon, 7 Jun 1999 10:35:02 -0400
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AN E-BULLETIN
LEGAL INFORMATION INSTITUTE -- CORNELL LAW SCHOOL
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
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The following decisions have just arrived via the LII's
direct Project HERMES feed from the Supreme Court.
These are not the decisions themselves nor excerpts from them,
but summaries (syllabi) prepared by the Court's Reporter of
Decisions. Instructions for accessing the full text of any of
these decisions are provided at the end of this bulletin, as are
instructions for subscribing in the event that this bulletin
has been given you by a colleague and you'd like a
subscription of your own.
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AMOCO PRODUCTION CO. v. SOUTHERN UTE TRIBE (98-830)
Web-accessible at:
http://supct.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/98-830.ZS.html
Argued April 19, 1999 -- Decided June 7, 1999
Opinion author: Kennedy
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Land patents issued to western settlers pursuant to the Coal
Lands Acts of 1909 and 1910 conveyed the land and everything in
it, except the "coal," which was reserved to the United States.
Patented lands included reservation lands previously ceded by
respondent Southern Ute Indian Tribe to the United States. In
1938, the United States restored to the Tribe, in trust, title
to ceded reservation lands still owned by the Government,
including the reserved coal in lands patented under the 1909
and 1910 Acts. These lands contain large quantities of coalbed
methane gas (CBM gas) within the coal formations. At the time
of the 1909 and 1910 Acts, such gas was considered a dangerous
waste product of coal mining, but it is now considered a
valuable energy source. Relying on a 1981 opinion by the
Solicitor of the Department of the Interior that CBM gas was
not included in the Acts' coal reservation, oil and gas
companies entered into CBM gas leases with the individual
landowners of some 200,000 acres of patented land in which the
Tribe owns the coal. The Tribe filed suit against petitioners,
the royalty owners and producers under the leases, and federal
agencies and officials (respondents here), seeking, inter alia,
a declaration that CBM gas is coal reserved by the 1909 and
1910 Acts. The District Court granted the defendants summary
judgment, holding that the plain meaning of the term "coal" in
the Acts is a solid rock substance that does not include CBM
gas. In reversing, the Tenth Circuit found the term ambiguous,
invoked the canon that ambiguities in land grants should be
resolved in favor of the sovereign, and concluded that the coal
reservation encompassed CBM gas. The Solicitor of the Interior
has withdrawn the 1981 opinion, and the United States now
supports the Tribe's position.
Held: The term "coal" as used in the 1909 and 1910 Acts does
not encompass CBM gas. Pp. 6-14.
(a) The question here is not whether, based on what
scientists know today, CBM gas is a constituent of coal, but
whether Congress so regarded it in 1909 and 1910. The common
understanding of coal at that time would not have encompassed
CBM gas. Most dictionaries of the day defined coal as the
solid fuel resource and CBM gas as a distinct substance that
escaped from coal during mining, rather than as a part of the
coal itself. As a practical matter, moreover, it is clear that
Congress intended to reserve only the solid rock fuel that was
mined, shipped throughout the country, and then burned to power
the Nation's railroads, ships, and factories. Public land
statutes should be interpreted in light of the country's
condition when they were passed, Leo Sheep Co. v. United
States, 440 U.S. 668, 682, and coal, not gas, was the primary
energy for the Industrial Revolution. Congress passed the Acts
to address concerns over the short supply, mismanagement, and
fraudulent acquisition of this solid rock fuel and chose a
narrow reservation to address these concerns. That Congress
viewed CBM gas as a dangerous waste product is evident from
earlier mine-safety legislation that prescribed specific
ventilation standards to dilute such gas. Congress' view was
confirmed by the fact that coal companies venting the gas while
mining coal made no attempt to capture or preserve the gas. To
the extent that Congress was aware of limited and sporadic
drilling for CBM gas as fuel, there is every reason to think it
viewed this as drilling for natural gas. Such a distinction is
significant, since the question is not whether Congress would
have thought that CBM gas had fuel value, but whether Congress
thought it was coal fuel. In the 1909 and 1910 Acts, Congress
chose to reserve only coal, not oil, natural gas, or other
energy resources. This reservation's limited nature is
confirmed by subsequent enactments, in which Congress used
explicit terms to reserve gas rights. Pp. 8-12.
(b) Respondents contend that Congress did not reserve
the solid coal but convey the CBM gas because the resulting
split estate would be impractical and mining would be difficult
if miners had to capture and preserve escaping CBM gas. It is
unlikely that Congress considered this issue, since it did not
think that CBM gas would be a profitable energy source. Nor
would the prospect of a split estate have deterred Congress
from reserving only coal, since including CBM gas in the coal
reservation would create a split estate between CBM gas and
natural gas, which would be at least as difficult to administer
as a split coal/CBM gas estate. Pp. 12-14.
151 F.3d 1251, reversed.
Kennedy, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which
Rehnquist, C. J., and Stevens, O'Connor, Scalia, Souter, and
Thomas, JJ., joined. Ginsburg, J., filed a dissenting opinion.
Breyer, J., took no part in the consideration or decision of
the case.
Reprinted under the fair use http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html
doctrine of international copyright law.
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Tsonkwadiyonrat (We are ONE Spirit)
Unenh onhwa' Awayaton
http://www.tdi.net/ishgooda/
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