Youthquake

Do Americans have a constitutional right to a livable planet? Twenty-one young people say they do—and are suing the Trump administration to prove it. Julia Felsenthal talks to the Youth v. Gov plaintiffs about their fight for the future.

VIC BARRETT, A NINETEEN-YEARold climate activist from New York, has three tattoos on his arm. One depicts a daisy and a lily; another a rose and a skull, captioned aut vincere aut mori—Latin for “to conquer or to die.” The third is the number 370.

“It’s the amount of parts per million of carbon that were in the atmosphere the year I was born,” Barrett explains. Today we’re past 400, and many scientists agree we’re in the danger zone until we drop to 350, a goal that requires a radical worldwide curbing of greenhouse gas emissions. The ink is a reminder: “There’ve been whole generations of kids born into a world that can’t sustain them.”

Barrett is doing his part to change that. He’s one of 21 young plaintiffs—ranging from eleven to 23 years old—who are suing the Trump administration for contributing to climate change. (The case, officially Juliana v. United States, goes by the nickname Youth v. Gov.) Their argument is rooted in the constitution: It’s tough to enjoy life, liberty, and property on an increasingly inhospitable planet, and their generation will suffer the most.

In October, a United Nations report raised the stakes sky high: If our global emissions continue at the current rate, it will lead to climate catastrophe, with a window of just over a decade to reverse course. “These [reports] have been getting progressively more dire,” says Barrett’s coplaintiff, nineteen-year-old Nathan Baring. “This one set out a very specific timeline and in a very forceful way.”