SOUTH CAROLINA – A coalition of 11 leading environmental and advocacy organizations filed an amicus curiae brief on April 20 in the South Carolina Supreme Court, urging the Court to uphold the legal doctrine of public importance standing. The brief was filed in response to a case involving the ACLU of South Carolina, where defendants, including Governor McMaster, have asked the Court to eliminate public importance standing – a legal principle that ensures South Carolinians can challenge government actions threatening the most vital public environmental resources, even when no single individual can prove a specific, personal injury.

The brief, submitted by the South Carolina Environmental Law Project (SCELP) on behalf of the coalition, argues that public importance standing is a cornerstone of equitable access to justice in environmental cases. It ensures that when our state’s environment is most at risk, the public has a voice in court. The brief emphasizes that public importance standing promotes consistency and fairness in the legal system, ensuring that cases involving broad public harm – such as pollution, habitat destruction or mismanagement of public trust resources – can be heard in court. Without it, harmful decisions affecting the state’s most significant natural systems could be unchallengeable, leaving no recourse.

“Public importance standing keeps the courthouse doors open when issues of the highest environmental significance are at stake,” said Michael Corley, Deputy Director at South Carolina Environmental Law Project. “When shared environmental resources are threatened, access to the courts should not depend on a single individual showing personal injury. Eliminating this doctrine would strip away a critical tool for protecting the places that define our state.”

The coalition includes: South Carolina Coastal Conservation League; Sierra Club; League of Women Voters of South Carolina; Friends of Coastal South Carolina; Charleston Waterkeeper; Savannah Riverkeeper; Winyah Rivers Alliance; Gullah/Geechee Sea Island Coalition; Congaree Riverkeeper; Coastal Expeditions; and Carolina Ocean Alliance.

The brief also highlights the unpredictable and inconsistent results produced by traditional standing requirements in environmental cases, where courts often struggle to reconcile ecological harm with individualized injury. Public importance standing recognizes that harm to our shared environment is harm to us all. Without it, the ability to hold decision-makers accountable would be severely weakened.

The South Carolina Supreme Court’s decision in this case will have far-reaching implications for environmental advocacy and public participation in the state. The coalition urges the Court to uphold public importance standing as a vital safeguard for South Carolina’s natural systems and the communities that depend on them.