Mtn. States comes to the flatlands.
FACTSHEET: Mountain States Legal Foundation,
MSLF DETAILS 2596 South Lewis Way Lakewood, Colorado 80227
Phone: 303-292-2021 Fax: 303-292-1980
A conservative public interest law founded in 1977 under the National Legal Center for Public Interest, with start up money largely provided by Joseph Coors. MSLF is “dedicated to individual liberty, the right to own and use property, limited and ethical government and the free enterprise system.” (mslf website) The group, initially headed by James Watt and now run by William Perry Pendley. Pendley has referred to environmentalists as communists in disguise, or “watermelons”- “green on the outside and red on the inside.” ( “Whither the West,” The Landman, January/February 1993.) MSLF files cases and amicus curiae briefs attacking environmental protections and designations on behalf of oil, mineral, development and timber interests. Ron Arnold, anti-environmental leader and executive director of the Center for the Defense of Free Enterprise, called MSLF “the litigating arm of the Wise Use Movement.” MSLF is active in the “wise use” and extremist property rights movement, was a sponsor of the first “wise use” leadership conference in Reno, Nevada in 1988, and has participated in many conferences hosted by “wise use” organizations. (CLEAR fact sheet) Over the past two decades, MSLF has served as a training ground for a number of attorneys most active in the anti-environmental movement., including Interior Secretary Gale Norton, Clint Bolick, William “Chip” Mellor and Karen Budd-Falen, Anne Gorsuch-Burford, and Roger and Nancie Marzulla, who started Defenders of Property Rights.
Mountain States Legal Foundation has received $2,500 from ExxonMobil since 1998.
2000
$2,500 ExxonMobil Foundation
general support
Source: ExxonMobil Foundation 2000 IRS 990
early 90s?
$unknown Exxon Corporation
Source: Greenpeace Guide
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