Environmental law rests on police power over private activity, not government property ownership.

Evidence

The core regulatory premise of much environmental protection law today is the sovereign’s police power to regulate private activities that adversely affect public health and welfare because of the impact of those activities on the natural environment notwithstanding property claims. — Richard J. Lazarus, The Making of Environmental Law, 246

Categorization

• DEFINE: Defines the regulatory premise shift: from proprietary ownership authority (managing government-owned lands) to sovereign police power over private activity harming public health. This is the legal-institutional core distinguishing 1970s environmental law from prior natural resource law.
• XREF: Directly connects to the polyad thread on law/institutions and to “Complaints About Immodesty” article’s treatment of police power in moral-regulation history, plus the property-absolutism debates in legal theory. — connects to: Federal pollution law rests on Commerce Clause because courts cannot handle modern nuisance cases — Richard J. Lazarus, The Making of Environmental Law, 782

Broader Connections

• Federal pollution law rests on Commerce Clause because courts cannot handle modern nuisance cases #expands (0.85) — Richard J. Lazarus, The Making of Environmental Law, 782