Property law’s boundary-invasion frame cannot address external pollution threats to federal lands

Evidence

During the past thirty years, however, federal natural resources law has increasingly relied on tort-like principles as federal policies have shifted toward greater promotion of resource preservation and the prevention of undue resource degradation of those resources selected for development. Like any other landowner, the federal government discovered that a property doctrine that emphasizes the inviolability of physical boundaries from discrete physical invasion does not readily lend itself to addressing external threats. Air pollution, water pollution, and noise pollution, although commencing far outside the borders of a federal property, may incrementally, yet severely, destroy the property’s essential ecological features. — Richard J. Lazarus, The Making of Environmental Law, 792

Categorization

• XREF: The property-law-limits insight echoes ch1’s point that ecological harm spills across boundaries — law’s boundaries cannot hold against pollution. — connects to: Interior’s power rests on federal ownership of nearly a third of the nation’s lands — Richard J. Lazarus, The Making of Environmental Law, 783; Federalist Society federalism opposes the deliberately national structure of pollution statutes — Richard J. Lazarus, The Making of Environmental Law, 538; Both property and tort theories of environmental authority have unavoidable limits — Richard J. Lazarus, The Making of Environmental Law, 787 (+2 more)
• recurring: this claim recurs 2 times within its source

Broader Connections

• Both property and tort theories of environmental authority have unavoidable limits #expands (0.82) — Richard J. Lazarus, The Making of Environmental Law, 787
• Land-use harms regularly cross property boundaries #expands (0.78) — Adam Rome, The Bulldozer in the Countryside, 947
• State land-use laws redefined land development as a public rather than strictly private matter #complicates (0.72) — Adam Rome, The Bulldozer in the Countryside, 939