This casebook is the authoritative introduction to public land and resources law. The eighth edition is completely updated, including thorough revisions of all chapters, considerable streamlining, and many new principal cases. The new edition increases emphasis on climate change, renewable energy, social justice (especially as it relates to Native Americans), Alaskan public lands, and other topics of contemporary interest. Professor Fischman’s website https://land.law.indiana.edu/ uses the casebook outline to post new developments and supplemental materials. Readers will find there a rich assortment of supplemental materials such as maps and links to administrative records that can serve as research guides for students preparing papers. A password-protected set of teachers’ resources includes exams, syllabi, classroom assignments, and tips for teaching.


Imprint: Foundation Press
Series: University Casebook Series
Publication Date: 12/23/2021
Related Subject(s): Natural Resources

John D. Leshy, UC College of the Law, San Francisco

Robert L. Fischman, Indiana University School of Law - Bloomington

Sarah A. Krakoff, University of Colorado School of Law

CasebookPlus™

This title is available in our CasebookPlus format. CasebookPlus provides support beyond your classroom lectures and materials by offering additional digital resources to you and your students. Anchored by faculty-authored formative self-assessments keyed to our most popular casebooks, CasebookPlus allows students to test their understanding of core concepts as they are learning them in class – on their own, outside of the classroom, with no extra work on your part. CasebookPlus combines three important elements:

  • A new print or digital casebook
  • Access to a downloadable eBook with the ability to highlight and add notes
  • 12-month access to a digital Learning Library complete with:
Multiple-choice self-assessment questions, including:
  • Chapter questions keyed to the casebook
  • Black Letter Law questions (available in select subjects)
  • Subject area review questions for end of semester use
Essay and short answer questions with sample answers and expert commentary, in 1L and select upper-level subjects

Leading digital study aids, an outline starter, and audio lectures in select subjects

Students can still utilize CasebookPlus digital resources if they’ve purchased a used book or are renting their text by purchasing the Learning Library at westacademic.com.

With CasebookPlus, you can customize your students’ learning experience and monitor their performance. The quiz editor allows you to create your own custom quiz set, suppress specific quiz questions or quiz sets, and time-release quiz questions. Additionally, the flexible, customized reporting capability helps you evaluate your students’ understanding of the material and can also help your school demonstrate compliance with the new ABA Assessment and Learning Outcomes standards.

The eighth edition reflects some reorganization as well as new material. As always, it is structured for classes to cover the foundational material in chapters 1-5 efficiently before getting to selected resource-specific chapters (6–14), each of which stands on its own. The book aims to challenge students while conveying the sense of human drama and place that attracted each of us to this legal specialty. This new edition contains more references and discussion prompts regarding historical injustices and current inequities. Chapter 1, for instance, contains a new excerpt from Prof. Krakoff on public lands and possibility of justice. Chapter 2 expands on the racist legacy of Johnson v. M’Intosh and other cases at the heart of public land history. Our new Chapter 14 explores “Heritage and Native Nations,” combining material that formerly we covered in Chapters 5 and 13 on the Antiquities Act and other issues regarding Native American ties to public lands. For the first time, this edition includes a Glossary of Acronyms to help readers keep track of the alphabet soup.

Other changes include a new principal preemption case, Bohmker v. Oregon, in Chapter 3’s preemption coverage in state-federal relations. We added WildEarth Guardians v. U.S. Bureau of Land Management, a new principal case addressing climate change, in our Chapter 4 coverage of NEPA. In moving the Antiquities Act to Chapter 14, we consolidate all the materials on FLPMA’s provisions dealing with withdrawals, sales, and exchanges (formerly divided between Chapters 5 & 7) into Chapter 5. We also include the new principal case of Nat’l Mining Ass’n v. Zinke in the subchapter on FLPMA withdrawals. We responded to reader requests for more detail on the special rules that apply to management of federal lands in Alaska with a new subchapter containing a new principal case—the Supreme Court’s 2019 decision in Sturgeon v. Frost.

We restructured Chapter 7 on “Hardrock Mining” to clearly guide students through both acquisition of mineral rights and limitations on their exercise. A new principal case, Earthworks v. U.S. Department of the Interior, explores whether the vast scale of modern hardrock mining is compatible with the arcane limitations of the still-surviving Mining Law of 1872. Chapter 8, retitled simply “Energy,” now provides greater treatment of climate change, including two new principal cases––California v. Bernhardt and WildEarth Guardians v. Zinke. We rewrote the Solar Energy Problem to better portray the issues that have arisen in recent years regarding BLM permitting of renewable energy facilities through its FLPMA authorities. Chapter 9’s coverage of federal forest management includes a new principal case, Cowpasture River Preservation Ass’n v. Forest Service, addressing when old national forest plans must be revised under the 2012 planning rule. Its treatment of biological monitoring for diversity now includes an excerpt of the Lands Council III decision. Chapter 10, renamed “Livestock Grazing,” offers an updated, more concise presentation of materials from our previous edition. Revised Chapter 11 on Wildlife does the same. Chapter 12, “Recreation,” presents new material from the Supreme Court’s Cowpasture decision on the division of authority between agencies for Appalachian Trail easements. Its subchapter on off-road motorized recreation updates developments on national forests with the aid of a new principal excerpt from WildEarth Guardians v. Montana Snowmobile Ass’n. Chapter 13 now focuses on three federal preservation systems for wilderness, rivers, and marine resources. The material on archaeological, cultural, and historical resources formerly in Chapter 13 is now combined with the national monuments in a new Chapter 14 on “Heritage and Native Nations.”

Learn more about this series.