e, the mootness doctrine would not apply.
Neither will the Court hear cases which are not ripe --i.e. "if the controversy is premature --has insufficiently gelled--for review" (Text, p. 100). The leading cases are United Public Workers v. Mitchell (1947), and International Longshoreman's Union v. Boyd (1954). In Mitchell, enforcement of the federal Hatch Act represented only a potential as opposed to an actual violation of the interests of all but one of the plaintiffs. And in Boyd a federal law imposing certain requirements on aliens entering the United States from Alaska had not yet been applied to any individuals. In both cases the Court held the lawsuits in question to be hypothetical and not yet sufficiently ripe for judicial decisions.
Both of the hypothetical cases would probably fail to pass muster under the ripeness doctrine. In Sierra Club, there is no evidence that the Army Corps of Engineers has yet begun work under the statute in question nor in Tree Huggers that any federal tax monies had been spent or environmental damage caused under that Act.
To have standing to sue in the federal courts, plaintiffs must prove that they have a personal stake in the outcome of the litigation. In Sierra Club, plaintiff asserted that the statute would injure mosquitoes. Threatened damage to insects is not sufficient; there must be damage to the plaintiff. To overcome the standing problem, plaintiff would have to amend its pleadings to allege that implementation of the statute would damage the environment and thereby impair the interests of its members in the maintenance of a pristine environment in the wetlands.
Traditionally, a plaintiff could not establish his standing to sue by alleging that their taxes would be wasted under the statute. See Frothingham v. Mellon (1923). That case involved a challenge to the constitutionality of a federal maternity leave act which provided federal aid to the states to reduce infant mort...