From Attorney General Greg Zoeller:

Volatile issues of global climate change, energy-sector jobs, judicial activism and the roles of federal government branches will collide April 19. That’s when the United States Supreme Court hears arguments in a case with a potential to affect indirectly all Americans who use electricity.

The case is American Electric Power Co. Inc. v. Connecticut. At issue is whether states and private plaintiffs can sue utility companies for producing greenhouse gases that contribute to global climate change.

The state I represent in court, Indiana, is not a party in this lawsuit. Nonetheless, as Indiana’s attorney general, my duty is to alert the Supreme Court to Indiana’s legal concerns. To raise our arguments, we authored a 28-page amicus brief that 22 other states signed, and filed it with the nation’s highest court.

The facts of the AEP v. Connecticut case and its procedural history are complicated and the underlying science is technical. But at its core is a concept that dates to the very founding of our Constitution: the separation of powers of our three branches of government.

In our brief we contend federal district courts are not the venues to decide inherently political questions that belong instead within the legislative and executive branches.

Consider how this case began: Connecticut filed suit against six utility companies alleging their carbon dioxide emissions from coal-fired electric-generating plants contribute to global climate change. Connecticut, five other states and New York City alleged a “public nuisance” under common law and asked the federal court to determine and impose limits on the amounts of CO2 emitted from utility smokestacks.

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