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W.J. McCabe Chapter Izaak Walton League of America

February 10, 2000, DNT

Judge dismisses logging suit

Ruling finds environmental efforts don't constitute religion

By John Myers

Duluth News-Tribune outdoors writer

A federal judge ruled Wednesday that environmental activists aren't pushing a religion when they seek to reduce logging on national forests.

In a scathing decision against attorney Stephen Young, who filed the lawsuit for a group of northern Minnesota loggers, Judge James Rosenbaum said the case not only lacks merit but was intended toharass the defendants.

The suit was filed by the Associated Contract Loggers against two environmental groups and the U.S. Forest Service for pushing and adopting the ``religion of Deep Ecology'' in public lands timber policy.

Rosenbaum gave Young 15 days to argue why the court shouldn't impose financial sanctions against Young for filing a frivolous lawsuit. ``It appears probable that Plaintiffs have knowingly drawn this Court into an unseemly and baseless lawsuit, and have wasted the court's time and the defendant's valuable time and money,'' Rosenbaum wrote in his decision, adding that the lawsuit ``falls far below the minimal standards.''

While an appeal is promised, Rosenbaum's decision to stop the suit before trial is a setback to loggers' efforts to counter environmentalists and a federal logging policy that has seen fewer trees cut on national forests in recent years.

Facing stagnant prices from mills and increased costs and restrictions to cut trees, some loggers say they are fighting for their economic future.

Young said he will ask the 8th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals to reverse Rosenbaum's decision because the judge ignored many key arguments.

``There is a limit in our Democratic system to the extent to which religion can drive government policy,'' Young said. The judge ``omitted key points of our case that back that up. The real issues in this case haven't been addressed yet.''

But Ray Fenner, executive director of the Superior Wilderness Action Network -- named as a defendant in the suit -- said the ruling makes it clear religion has nothing to do with the logging issue. Fenner said he hopes Rosenbaum's sharp words will encourage loggers to drop the suit.

``Every page of the decision seems to back us up. We were surprised at how strongly the judge agreed with us,'' Fenner said. ``I respect the right of loggers to disagree with me on how the public's land is managed. But this (decision) should make it clear that nobody can stop anyone else from petitioning their government.''

Experts on both sides have said the suit could have national implications, both as an effort by the Wise Use movement to reduce regulations on federal land, and as a test case on separation of church and state.

The case surfaced last fall when Young, known for controversial and conservative stands on government issues, joined with the Tower-based Associated Contract Loggers to initiate the suit. Young supports decreased federal regulation and increased commercial use of federal lands. And he said loggers had a case against the Forest Service and environmental activists.

The suit sought to declare anti-logging activism as a religious belief called ``deep ecology'' that, while allowable as a personal belief, breaks the constitutionally guaranteed separation of church and state when it leads to federal policy.

In the suit, SWAN and Forest Guardians -- which have filed appeals to limit or stop specific timber sales on federal lands -- were accused of pushing deep ecology and the Forest Service was accused of adopting it. The suit claimed that the Forest Service ``has allowed itself to be used as a tool, agent or instrument of defendants SWAN and Forest Guardians for religious purposes.''

Rosenbaum's 21-page decision repeatedly dismissed that thinking. ``This somewhat bizarre assertion is neither supported in law nor in the complaints' own factual allegations,'' Rosenbaum wrote in his decision.

Far from being in alliance with the government, Rosenbaum noted, environmental groups named have often been at odds with the Forest Service.

Young's claim that SWAN's efforts to slow logging are legal when kept in check but illegal when they become effective in changing government policy are ``so clearly wrong as to beggar conventional legal analysis. The right to petition is absolutely fundamental to the First Amendment,'' Rosenbaum wrote in the decision.

Rosenbaum bristled at Young's claims that judges should determine before a trial whether anti-logging efforts were based on religion.

``The concept of a court's prescreening a party's religious views, and requiring them to prove that its claims are not religiously based, is disturbing, and runs counter to the protections set forth by the Constitution,'' Rosenbaum wrote.

Larry Jones, ACL's executive director, could not be reached for comment Wednesday.

The case followed two high-profile lawsuits by SWAN and other groups seeking to reduce logging in specific areas of the Superior National Forest -- Little Alfie and Little East Creek. Both cases delayed logging but were eventually dismissed.

Forest Service officials say the recent decline in logging in national forests is because of increases in costs to prepare timber sales, environmental review and public value placed on other aspects of the forest -- including wildlife habitat, old-growth species, recreation and aesthetics.

There's also increased public criticism of the Forest Service's road-building program, which generally loses money opening areas to logging.

While the cases have received considerable attention, logging on national forests accounts for only about 5 percent of all trees cut in the state and about the same nationally. Most trees cut in Minnesota come from private and county lands, which have seen increases in timber harvest in recent years.

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