The Children’s Climate Crusade

The press is cheering a group of Montana children who prevailed this week in state court with a radical new legal theory on climate change. Sorry to interrupt the enthusiasm, but progressives who claim to be defenders of democracy are hijacking the courts to ram through a climate agenda that voters don’t want.

The Montana state constitution prescribes a right to a “clean and healthful environment,” and public-interest lawyers are hoping this clause is broad enough to drive a subsidized electric bus through. An outfit called Our Children’s Trust brought a suit from 16 Montana youth who allege they are harmed by climate change and the state’s energy policies.

On Monday state district Judge Kathy Seeley bought the argument, striking down as unconstitutional measures that preclude the state from considering greenhouse-gas emissions as part of project approvals. The 103-page decision is more spiritual experience than legal analysis. “Plaintiffs’ injuries will grow increasingly severe and irreversible without science-based actions to address climate change,” the judge wrote.

The plaintiffs claim injuries that can’t be traced to the state’s actions or in some cases even to climate change. The state argued in filings that Montana is responsible for a rounding error in world greenhouse gas emissions—0.0862%.

One complaint from plaintiffs is smoky air. Wildfire smoke and heat “adversely impact” a teenager named Grace’s “ability to play competitive soccer,” the suit said. Grace’s alleged injury is built on unproven cause and effect. There’s no proof that climate change is the main cause of fires that aren’t increasing in any case, as Bjorn Lomborg recently showed in these pages. It also ignores decades of misguided forest management practices in the U.S. and Canada.

A plaintiff named Georgi lamented that her “ability to compete and participate in Nordic skiing has been directly impacted by climate disruption,” the complaint notes. Who knew there was a right to a snowy winter in Montana law? Climatologist Judith Curry, in an analysis filed on the behalf of the state, points out that most of the past seven years have “shown normal to above normal spring snowpack across Montana.”

The plaintiff claims are so dubious that they shouldn’t survive on appeal, which Montana plans to file. But the climate left will take this strategy on the road and try to persuade ideologically sympathetic judges like Ms. Seeley to do what legislatures won’t.

The filings are depressing reading for another reason, as adults have terrified children for political gain. Hey, Johnnie, all your stuffed animals are heading for extinction unless we ban oil and gas drilling that employs your father. “Mica’s favorite animal is the pika; however, as the number of pikas continues to decline,” the suit says, it will be difficult “for Mica to see or hear pikas while recreating outdoors.”

Another plaintiff claimed “bouts of depression” about the climate and feeling “heartbroken and desperate.” These young people ought to sue the adults who have misled them about climate apocalypse.