United States Tenth Circuit

The Administrative Procedures Act (APA) does not waive sovereign immunity for plaintiffs, who claim no adverse interest in the land at issue, to bring a suit challenging the issuance of a patent under the 1872 Mining Law.

Appellate Information

• Decided 07/21/2006
• Published 07/24/2006

Judges

• KELLY, Circuit Judge., Before KELLY, BRISCOE, Circuit Judges and JOHNSON, District Judge.

Court

• United States Tenth Circuit

Counsel

• For Appellant:
  
• Roger Flynn (and Jeffrey C. Parsons, Western Mining Action Project, Lyons, Colorado, for Plaintiffs-Appellants High Country Citizens' Alliance and the Town of Crested Butte, Laura Magner, Crested Butte, Colorado, for Plaintiff-Appellant Town of Crested Butte, and David Baumgarten and Thomas A. Dill, County Attorney's Office, Gunnison, Colorado, for Plaintiff-Appellant Board of County Commissioners of the County of Gunnison, on the briefs).


• For Appellees:
  
• Aaron P. Avila (and Todd S. Aagaard, U.S. Department of Justice, Environment and Natural Resources Div., Kelly A Johnson, Acting Assistant Attorney General, William J. Leone, United States Attorney, Roxane J. Perruso, Assistant United States Attorney, and Karen Hawbecker and Kendra Nitta, Office of the Solicitor, Division of Mineral Resources, Department of the Interior, on the brief), Washington, D.C., for the Federal Defendants-Appellees., David S. Steefel (and Frank Erisman, on the brief), Holme, Roberts & Owen, L.L.P., Denver, Colorado, for Defendants-Appellees Phelps Dodge Corporation and Mount Emmons Mining Company.