Trustees for Alaska v. State

• Decision Date: 01 May 1987
• Docket Number: No. S-1142,S-1142
• Citation: 736 P.2d 324
• Parties: TRUSTEES FOR ALASKA, Nunam Kitlutsisti, Dinyea Corporation, Village of Minto, Alaska Independent Fishermen's Marketing Association, Alaska Center for the Environment, Southeast Alaska Conservation Council, Friends of the Earth, Plaintiffs/Appellants, v. STATE of Alaska, Alaska Department of Natural Resources, Esther Wunnicke, Commissioner, Department of Natural Resources, Defendants/Appellees, Alaska Miners Association, Fairbanks North Star Borough and Joseph E. Vogler, Defendants-Intervenors/Appellees.
• Court: Alaska Supreme Court

Page 324

736 P.2d 324

TRUSTEES FOR ALASKA, Nunam Kitlutsisti, Dinyea Corporation Village of Minto, Alaska Independent Fishermen's Marketing Association, Alaska Center for the Environment, Southeast Alaska Conservation Council, Friends of the Earth Plaintiffs/Appellants, v. STATE of Alaska, Alaska Department of Natural Resources Esther Wunnicke, Commissioner, Department of Natural Resources, Defendants/Appellees Alaska Miners Association, Fairbanks North Star Borough and Joseph E. Vogler, Defendants-Intervenors/Appellees.

No. S-1142.

Supreme Court of Alaska.

May 1, 1987.

Eric Smith and Robert W. Adler, Anchorage, for plaintiffs/appellants.

Robert M. Maynard and Mark P. Worcester, Asst. Attys. Gen., Anchorage, Harold M. Brown, Atty. Gen., Juneau, for defendant/appellee State of Alaska, Alaska Dept. of Natural Resources, and Esther Wunnicke, Com'r, Dept. of Natural Resources.

James N. Reeves, Bogle & Gates, Anchorage, for defendant/appellee Alaska Miners Ass'n.

Ronald A. Zumbrun, Robin L. Rivett, and James S. Burling, Pacific Legal Foundation, Sacramento, Cal., and Michael B. Markham, Borough Atty., Fairbanks, for defendant/appellee Fairbanks North Star Borough.

Thomas R. Wickwire, Fairbanks, for defendant/appellee Joseph E. Vogler.

Before RABINOWITZ, C.J., and BURKE, MATTHEWS, COMPTON and MOORE, JJ.

OPINION

MATTHEWS, Justice.

Alaska was granted the right to select 103,350,000 acres of land from the United States under section 6(a) and (b) of the Alaska Statehood Act, Pub.L. No. 85-508, 72 Stat. 339 (1958) (set out in a note preceding 48 U.S.C. § 21 (1982)). Mineral deposits in selected lands were also conveyed, subject to certain restrictions. Section 6(i) of the Act provides:

All grants made or confirmed under this Act shall include mineral deposits. The grants of mineral lands to the State of Alaska under subsections (a) and (b) of this section are made upon the express condition that all sales, grants, deeds, or patents for any of the mineral lands so granted shall be subject to and contain a reservation to the State of all of the minerals in the lands so sold, granted, deeded, or patented, together with the right to prospect for, mine, and remove the same. Mineral deposits in such lands shall be subject to lease by the State as the State legislature may direct: Provided, That any lands or minerals hereafter disposed of contrary to the provisions of this section shall be forfeited to the United States by appropriate proceedings instituted by the Attorney General for that purpose in the United States District Court for the District of Alaska.

This case presents issues concerning the meaning of the section 6(i) grant and restrictions, and of appellants' standing to bring an action in state court to construe the meaning of the Alaska Statehood Act.

I. PROCEEDINGS BELOW

The appellants are a coalition of environmental, Native, and fishing groups. They filed an action in superior court seeking a declaration that the state's mineral leasing system violates section 6(i) in that the state does not require payment of either rent or royalties in leases of lands subject to section 6(i), and that the state has incorrectly construed the section 6(i) restrictions to apply only to lands known to contain minerals at the time of state selection rather than to all selected lands which contain minerals. ¹

All parties moved for summary judgment. The trial court ruled that the appellants did not have standing, that section 6(i) is enforceable only by the Attorney General of the United States, and that the state's mineral management system does not violate section 6(i). The court did not rule on the question whether the section 6(i) restrictions apply to all state-selected lands containing minerals or merely to those known to contain minerals at the time of selection.

We conclude that appellants have standing to maintain this declaratory judgment action, that the state's mineral leasing system violates section 6(i) because it does not require the payment of rent or royalties on mining leases, and that section 6(i) applies only to those lands known to have been mineral in character at the time of state selection.

II. STANDING TO MAINTAIN DECLARATORY JUDGMENT ACTION

A. Standing

"Standing questions are limited to whether the litigant is a 'proper party to request an adjudication of a particular issue....' " Moore v. State, 553 P.2d 8, 24 n. 25 (Alaska 1976) (quoting Flast v. Cohen, 392 U.S. 83, 100-01, 88 S.Ct. 1942, 1952-53, 20 L.Ed.2d 947, 961 (1968)). Standing in our state courts is not a constitutional doctrine; rather, it is a rule of judicial self-restraint based on the principle that courts should not resolve abstract questions or issue advisory opinions. Id. The basic requirement for standing in Alaska is adversity. Id.

The concept of standing has been interpreted broadly in Alaska. We have "departed from a restrictive interpretation of the standing requirement," Coghill v. Boucher, 511 P.2d 1297, 1303 (Alaska 1973), adopting instead an approach "favoring increased accessibility to judicial forums." Moore v. State, 553 P.2d at 23; see also State v. Lewis, 559 P.2d 630, 634 n. 7 (Alaska) (and cases cited therein), cert. denied, 432 U.S. 901, 97 S.Ct. 2943, 53 L.Ed.2d 1073 (1977). Our cases have discussed two different kinds of standing. One is interest-injury standing; the other is citizen-taxpayer standing.

Under the interest-injury approach, a plaintiff must have an interest adversely affected by the conduct complained of. Such an interest may be economic, Moore, 553 P.2d at 24; Wagstaff v. Superior Court, Family Court Division, 535 P.2d 1220, 1225 (Alaska 1975), or it may be intangible, such as an aesthetic or environmental interest. Lewis, 559 P.2d at 635. The degree of injury to the interest need not be great; " '[t]he basic idea ... is that an identifiable trifle is enough for standing to fight out a question of principle; the trifle is the basis for standing and the principle supplies the motivation.' " Wagstaff, 535 P.2d at 1225 & n. 7 (quoting Davis, Standing: Taxpayers and Others, 35 U.Chi.L.Rev. 601, 613 (1968)).

In the instant case, the appellants assert that they have standing as citizens or taxpayers, rather than because their interests are injured. In prior cases, we have often permitted taxpayers or citizens to challenge governmental action based on their status as taxpayers or citizens. In many such cases, standing has been assumed and not discussed. ² We have, however, explicitly addressed taxpayer-citizen standing on other occasions. For example, in Coghill v. Boucher, 511 P.2d 1297 (Alaska 1973), registered voters (one of whom was also a poll watcher) were allowed to challenge certain proposed vote-counting procedures. In finding standing, we stated:

In the case at bar, we conclude that a retreat to restrictive notions of standing, as urged by appellee, would not advance the public's vital interest in maintenance of the integrity of vote-tallying procedures during statewide elections. Denial of standing to appellants in the instant case would have the effect of unduly limiting the possibility of a popular check upon executive control of the election process. If registered voters and poll watchers are foreclosed from seeking judicial review of administrative regulation of this sensitive aspect of our governmental system, then it may well be that any review of executive activity in this area would be completely foreclosed, particularly in the event that candidates or political parties were unwilling to challenge such administrative actions. We decline to restrict the public's access to Alaska's courts in such a manner.

Id. at 1304.

We also discussed the question of taxpayer standing in Lewis, 559 P.2d 630. At issue was the legality of a three-way land trade between the state, the federal government, and a native regional corporation. Our characterization of the plaintiffs' interest in Lewis applies in this case. "Here, plaintiffs are seeking to protect mineral resources in land originally selected from the federal government under the Statehood Act. Their interest in the state's retention of mineral rights in state lands is no less significant than the aesthetic and environmental values sought to be vindicated in Sierra Club [v. Morton, 405 U.S. 727, 92 S.Ct. 1361, 31 L.Ed.2d 636 (1972) ] and [United States v.] SCRAP [,412 U.S. 669, 93 S.Ct. 2405, 37 L.Ed.2d 254 (1973) ]." 559 P.2d at 635. We declined to decide whether standing should be allowed in all taxpayer or citizen actions, but we allowed taxpayer standing in Lewis. Several factors influenced our conclusion: the land transfer allegedly violated specific constitutional limitations, the transfer was significant in size and in its potential economic impact on the state, and no one seemed to be in a better position than the plaintiffs to complain of the illegality of the transaction. Id.

In Carpenter v. Hammond, 667 P.2d 1204 (Alaska), appeal dismissed, 464 U.S. 801, 104 S.Ct. 45, 78 L.Ed.2d 67 (1983), we affirmed, in an alternative holding, the standing of a citizen to challenge the reapportionment of a House District in which she did not reside or vote. We stated:

In the instant case, Carpenter alleges that District 2 violates a specific constitutional limitation and that the disputed transaction (the drawing of election district lines) arguably will have a significant impact on the state. Here the dispute over District 2 has been fully briefed, argued at trial and on appeal, and there is no one in a better position than Carpenter to litigate these issues. In our view, Carpenter also meets the standing criteria of Lewis.

Id. at 1210 (footnote omitted).

Gilman v. Martin, 662 P.2d 120 (Alaska 1983), involved a challenge to a municipal sale of land. We upheld taxpayer standing, stating that "[a]ny resident or taxpayer of a municipality has a sufficient interest in the disposition of a significant number of acres of the...