"if an (Endangered) Tree Falls in the Forest, And No One is Around ....": Resolving the Divergence Between Standing Requirements and Congressional Intent in Environmental Legislation‪.‬

INTRODUCTION During the mid-twentieth century, Congress passed a series of statutes that changed the face of American law. (1) Legislative protection was extended to the air, water, endangered species, and tracts of land where "the earth and its community of life [remain] untrammeled by man." (2) Many of these statutes include "citizen suit" provisions, an innovation designed to foster public participation in environmental protection. (3) The participation encouraged by citizen suits, however, did not follow the traditional model of civic involvement. Indeed, citizen suits were designed to "replace deficient programs of administrative enforcement" (4) with a body of "private attorneys general," (5) encouraging citizens to air their grievances in Article III courts rather than through the political process. (6) Understandably, this new (7) model of enforcement has evoked a wave of commentary and criticism. (8) In the court system, the influx of citizen suits has been accompanied by an evolution (or, many would say, devolution) of the doctrine of standing. Although the exact contours of the standing doctrine still remain unclear, (9) its most recent "phase" has proved challenging to plaintiffs attempting to enforce environmental statutes through citizen suits. (10) In several notable cases, plaintiffs have been barred from court despite Congress' apparent intent to enable "any person" to proceed with a citizen suit. (11) These plaintiffs were barred because they failed to assert a cognizable injury to themselves, although the statutes were seeking to protect the environment, (12) and citizen suit provisions do not require personal harm. (13)