Foundation on Economic Trends v. Heckler

Opinion for the court filed by Circuit Judge J. SKELLY WRIGHT.

Concurring opinion filed by Senior Circuit Judge MacKINNON.

J. SKELLY WRIGHT, Circuit Judge:

Almost 14 years ago, soon after passage of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), 42 U.S.C. § 4321 et seq. (1982), this court faced the challenge of ensuring that the Act’s “important legislative purposes, heralded in the halls of Congress, [were] not lost or misdirected in the vast hallways of the federal bureaucracy.” Calvert Cliffs’ Coordinating Committee v. USAEC, 449 F.2d 1109, 1111 (D.C.Cir.1971). This case poses a no less…