Sea Watch International v. Mosbacher

The Mid-Atlantic Regional Fishery Management Council (Council) (defendant) regulated the Mid-Atlantic surf-clam and quahog fisheries under a fishery management plan (FMP). In 1988, to both address and prevent overfishing, the Council proposed Amendment 8 to the FMP, which (1) implemented a system of individual transferable quotas (ITQ) applicable to each vessel fishing for surf-clams or quahogs; and (2) imposed additional restrictions on quahog fishing. Each ITQ permit holder was allotted a certain annual catch amount based on their assigned fixed percentage of the total aggregate catch quota for surf-clams and quahogs in the relevant fishing area. The ITQ’s fixed percentage was determined based on the vessel’s fishing history and the vessel’s size. An ITQ could be transferred to another vessel. Under the existing FMP, surf-clams were more heavily regulated than quahogs, resulting in an increasing number of vessels shifting into the less-regulated quahog fishery. Accordingly, Amendment 8 implemented additional quahog fishing restrictions to prevent expected future overfishing. Sea Watch International (SWI) (plaintiff) challenged Amendment 8, arguing that (a) the ITQ system exceeded the Council’s authority under the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act (Magnuson-Stevens Act); (b) the ITQ system violated National Standard 4 because, by tagging ITQs to vessels rather than fishermen, it treated similarly-situated fishermen differently and discriminated against small fishermen without large fleets; and (c) the additional quahog restrictions were arbitrary because they were issued in response to a potential future overfishing problem, not an existing problem. The Council moved to dismiss, arguing that (i) the ITQ system was tagged to vessels because there was a high rate of vessel turnover and only vessel fishing data, not individual fisherman data, was available; and (ii) establishing ground-rules for the quahog fishery before reasonably expected overfishing occurred was not arbitrary.