Here's the opening paragraph of the Ninth Circuit's opinion today affirming Judge Karlton's dismissal of a complaint against the U.S. Forest Service in Public Lands for the People, Inc. v. U.S. Dept. Agriculture, No. 11-15007:
The Wild West has long conjured up images of prospectors with pack mules and pickaxes foraging for gold. The oftromanticized ways of the Wild West eventually modernized and gave way to prospecting with the aid of motor vehicles and heavy machinery. The United States Forest Service (the “Forest Service”), an arm of the Department of Agriculture, recently limited the use of motor vehicles to certain roads in the century-old Eldorado National Forest (“ENF”). Concerned about the impact of the limitation on their activities, a group of miners and prospectors challenged the Forest Service’s decision. The district court dismissed the complaint, and we affirm.