Whose Land Is It The applicability of the Public Trust Doctrine
Whose Land Is It? The Public Trust Doctrine may very well emerge as the most influential tool for environmental protection. Its strength is evident as the doctrine has the capacity to override prior existing land rights, such as annulment of water rights previously allotted to the Los Angeles Department of Water in one of the PTD’s most influential cases, the Mono Lake Controversy. The ‘public trust’ is the concept that certain lands and resources belong to the whole people and that the government, which serves as a guardian, has an inescapable duty to manage these properties well. As potentially influential as the Public Trust Doctrine may prove to be, it is far from flawless, and its primary elements of debate include an uncertainty as to the extent that the doctrine should be adapted to meet the changing demands of society, the problem of competing uses, and the challenge of Takings with unjust compensation. Early History The Public Trust Doctrine is a product of the Roman Emperor and has its roots in the “Institutes of Justinian”, the body of Roman civil law that was compiled by the Emperor Justinian’s top legal scholars in 530 A. ... The law pertaining to the Public Trust stated that air, running water, and the seas, are common to all of mankind. At the time, the waterways were the most vital forum for commerce, prompting the seas and their shores to be noted as the primary example of what the doctrine protected. ... Certain lands were deemed to be owned by the states in trust for the public, hence the name the Public Trust Doctrine. What Should the Public Trust Doctrine Encompass? Since the doctrine’s conception into the American legal system, there has been much uncertainty in regards as to what extent the PTD should be administered and what the doctrine should encompass. In many ways, the doctrine has come a long way from its Roman and English common law beginnings, as it has in many states expanded far beyond protection of primary acts on navigable waters, such as commerce and quality, to protect other things such as bathing, swimming, and other recreational shore activities. According to the Supreme Court of New Jersey, “The Public Trust Doctrine, like all common law principles, should not be considered fixed or static, but should be molded and expanded to meet the changing conditions and needs of the public it was created to benefit. ... Therefore, it is evident that there is some uncertainty and a lack of uniformity in how the Public Trust Doctrine is applied, and to some, this fact threatens to establish a dangerous precedent.