Environmental Law: Difficult to Enact or Difficult to Repeal?

By Angela P. Krahulik, Ice Miller LLP

I recently read this article. It's a thought-provoking post from Eric Biber at Legal Planet. In it, Biber ponders whether it is more beneficial to make environmental laws hard to repeal or to make such laws hard to enact.

Making laws hard to repeal encourages long-term commitment to what may be irreversible environmental harms, results in laws resistant to short-term political pressures and spurs private and interest group involvement. On the other hand, making new environmental legislation easy to enact allows speedy reaction to changes in circumstances or knowledge. 

Does it have to be one or the other? Shouldn't the laws enacted be thought through enough to allow flexibility to account for changes? 

Biber's "tentative conclusion" is that the benefits of making environmental laws hard to repeal outweigh any benefits of making the legislation difficult to enact. Do you agree?

This post was written by Angela P. Krahulik, Ice Miller LLP. If you would like to submit content or write an article for the Environmental Law Section page, please email Mary Kay Price at mprice@indybar.org.