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Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife<tr style="text-align: center;"><td colspan="2">Image:Seal of the United States Supreme Court.png Supreme Court of the United States</td></tr>
Argued December 3, 1991 Decided June 12, 1992
<tr valign=top><td style="font-size: smaller;">Full case name: </td><td style="font-size: smaller;">Manuel Lujan, Jr., Secretary of the Interior, Petitioner v. Defenders of Wildlife, et al.</td></tr> <tr valign=top><td style="font-size: smaller;">Citations: </td><td style="font-size: smaller;">504 U.S. 555; 112 S. Ct. 2130; 119 L. Ed. 2d 351; 60 U.S.L.W. 4495; 1992 U.S. LEXIS 3543; 34 ERC (BNA) 1785; 92 Cal. Daily Op. Service 4985; 92 Daily Journal DAR 7876; 92 Daily Journal DAR 8967; 22 ELR 20913; 6 Fla. L. Weekly Fed. S 374</td></tr> <tr valign=top><td style="font-size: smaller; valign: top;">Prior history: </td><td style="font-size: smaller;">Defendant's motion to dismiss granted, Defenders of Wildlife v. Hodel, 658 F.Supp. 43 (D. Minn. 1987); reversed and remanded, 851 F.2d 1035 (8th Cir. 1988); summary judgment granted to plaintiffs, 707 F. Supp. 1082 (D. Minn. 1988); affirmed, sub nom. Defenders of Wildlife v. Lujan, 911 F.2d 117 (8th Cir. 1988); cert. granted, 500 U.S. 915 (1991)</td></tr> <tr valign=top><td style="font-size: smaller;">Subsequent history: </td><td style="font-size: smaller;">None</td></tr>
Holding
Plaintiffs did not have standing to bring suit under the Endangered Species Act, because the threat of a species' extinction alone did not established an individual and nonspeculative private injury. Eighth Circuit reversed.
Court membership
Chief Justice: William Rehnquist Associate Justices: Byron White, Harry Blackmun, John Paul Stevens, Sandra Day O'Connor, Antonin Scalia, Anthony Kennedy, David Souter, Clarence Thomas
Case opinions
Majority by: Scalia (parts I, II, III-A, IV) Joined by: Rehnquist, White, Kennedy, Souter, Thomas Concurrence by: Scalia (part III-B) Joined by: Rehnquist, White, Thomas Concurrence by: Kennedy Joined by: Souter Concurrence by: Stevens Dissent by: Blackmun Joined by: O'Connor <tr style="text-align: center; background: #6699FF;"><th colspan="2">Laws applied</tr></th><td>U.S. Const. art. III; 16 U.S.C. § 1536 (§ 7 of the Endangered Species Act of 1973)</td>

Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555 (1991), was a United States Supreme Court case in which the court held that a group of wildlife conservation and other environmental organizations lacked standing to challenge regulations jointly issued by the U.S. Secretaries of the Interior and Commerce, regarding the geographic area to which a particular section of the Endangered Species Act of 1973 applied.

The Court made clear that plaintiffs must suffer a concrete, imminent, discernible injury -- not a conjectural or hypothetical one -- to be able to bring suit in federal court. [I]n effect, made it more difficult for plaintiffs to challenge the actions of a government agency when the actions don't directly affect them. [1]