Norton v. S. Utah Wilderness Alliance

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Norton v. S. Utah Wilderness Alliance
Supreme Court of the United States
Argued March 29, 2004 Decided June 14, 2004
Full case name: Elk Grove Unified School District et al. v. Newdow et al. Citations: 542 U.S. 55
Holding
Court membership
Chief Justice: William Rehnquist Associate Justices: John Paul Stevens, Sandra Day O'Connor, Antonin Scalia, Anthony Kennedy, David Souter, Clarence Thomas, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer
Case opinions
Scalia took no part in the consideration or decision of the case.
Laws applied
Administrative Procedure Act 702, 704, 706.

Although the Administrative Procedure Act says that a person may challenge an agency's failure to act, this provision essential just carries forward the writ of mandamus. Thus an agency cannot be compelled to act unless there is some non-discretionary, discrete act. Therefore, in this case, an interest group could not challenge an agencies failure to "act so as to preserve the wilderness" in accordance with the statute.