Sacred standing: Giving water rights

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In furtherance of providing you more water-related resources and information, here’s the first paragraph of a blog post from the University of Denver Sturm College of Law Water Law Review blog:

Sacred standing: Giving water rights

Recently, a court in India has made a dramatic decision to give rivers legal rights in an attempt to curb pollution. While India’s Supreme Court overturned the ruling as legally unsustainable in July, this continues a global trend of recognizing the rights of water sources as opposed to just those that use the water. Potentially, this trend could come stateside, offering a unique way for Native American tribes to protect waters they consider sacred.

To read the full blog post view the University of Denver Sturm College of Law Water Law Review blog

One thought on “Sacred standing: Giving water rights

  1. Mitchell Ryan

    This really demeans and highlights the attack on the rights of individuals. I will admit, and it seems the opposition is operating from a similar point of view, this is just a differing world view. But the idea that inanimate objects can have rights is more superstition than my opposing view that humans have been given the world to take care of, and that they have dominion over it and everything upon it is for their benefit.

    IMO this is addressing a problem with the legal system by trying to remove a sick branch instead of the root.

    “He used the analogy of ships and corporations, both of which have legal personality that grants them rights in litigation.”

    This is the problem, and I think most recognize this but I think many people misinterpret the problem. The issue is not that corporations have rights per se, it’s that, essentially, under our system of US code and commercial statues, it’s that people are defined as corporations. People have been downgraded and their rights in the system of law eroded. At the same time, governments and registered groups have been elevated in their rights under the legal system.

    This is the cliff notes version obviously of a complex problem that’s been compounded over 100 years. But I think further elevating more categories to legal status comparing to human beings is the completely wrong direction.

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