Private: Roberts on the Environment

An article in today's Boston Globe reports that some environmental groups are viewing the Roberts nomination with trepidation after reviewing some of Roberts opinions.
Roberts seems to favor a very restrictive view of federal power to regulate the environment. In 2003 Roberts filed a dissent in the case of Rancho Viejo v Norton which involved a species of California toad whose existence was threatened by development. Roberts argued that the toad was not protected by federal law.

Roberts wrote that the Endangered Species Act cannot protect 'a hapless toad that, for reasons of its own, lives its entire life in California' because the Constitution only allows the regulation of matters involving more than one state.

Environmentalists note that:

Most of the nation's environmental laws -- including the Endangered Species Act, the Clean Air Act, and the Clean Water Act -- were passed under the Constitution's grant of power to the federal government to regulate "interstate commerce." Any effort to limit the scope of that power could substantially reduce environmental protection.

Such a view is troubling to environmentalists who believe that the extinction of a species, even if that species is geographically confined to one state, has a ripple effect on the natural food chain and the ecosystem that can be felt across the nation.
Furthermore, in 1992, while serving as deputy solicitor general in the George H.W. Bush administration:

Roberts successfully argued before the Supreme Court that an environmental group, Defenders of Wildlife, had no standing to sue the government when the administration changed a rule in order to narrow the scope of the Endangered Species Act.

Conservatives, seeking to protect Roberts from being attacked by environmental groups, issued talking points noting that Roberts:

While in private practice (worked) free of charge, on a case important to environmentalists. He persuaded the Supreme Court to allow Lake Tahoe to impose a ban on further development around its shores without having to compensate landowners.

Such a record was enough to persuade one prominent environmental leader to give Roberts a chance to make his case:

'He's got, like every other judge, decisions on both sides,' said David Bookbinder, legal director of the Sierra Club. 'We're eyeing him cautiously, and we are going to thoroughly read everything and listen to his testimony and then make a decision.'