New Opportunities for Native American Tribes to Pursue Environmental and Natural Resource Claims

Abstract

Native American tribes should take advantage of recent trends in environmental law to pursue claims for damages to their natural resources and their well-being. This article considers civil actions in tribal courts, citizen suits, toxic torts, and claims under parens patriae. While tribal regulatory jurisdiction in the environmental arena has increased, tribal jurisdiction has declined. This has led to an increase in environmental citizen suits, which have enjoyed varying degrees of success. Toxic torts have emerged as an alternative to the traditional route of pursuing claims under federal statutes. Parens patriae is another unexplored method by which tribes may assume the same natural resource defense authority that is allocated to states.

Keywords: opportunities, native, tribes, pursue, national, resource, claims