Fifth Circuit Rules Constitution Guarantees No Clean Water

A divided Fifth Circuit ruled the Constitution does not guarantee clean drinking water or truthful official statements, dismissing Jackson, Mississippi residents' lead water suit.

On September 4, the full US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit upheld dismissal of a lawsuit filed in 2022 by four Jackson, Mississippi residents — Priscilla Sterling, Raine Becker, Shawn Miller, and John Bennett — over the city's lead-contaminated water system. Judge Kurt Engelhardt, a Donald Trump appointee, wrote that while the deprivation of clean water was "grievous," it did not infringe any "deeply rooted constitutional right." The court also held there is no constitutional right to "truthful information from officials during a public health crisis." Engelhardt wrote that "the Constitution does not provide redress for every governmental wrongdoing." The New American reports the en banc court split 10 to 5, with Engelhardt joined by nine other Republican-appointed judges.

The en banc ruling reversed course within the same circuit: a divided three-judge Fifth Circuit panel in 2025 had revived the residents' claim, finding their allegations plausibly implicated the right to bodily integrity, before that ruling was vacated when the full court took the case. The majority reasoned that bodily-integrity precedent covers direct intrusions such as forced surgery, involuntary medicating, and sexual assault by a police officer, while water-system mismanagement is "wholly different." Bloomberg Law News reports the court also said residents would have been denied relief anyway because officials held qualified immunity, since no clearly established right was violated.

Testing cited in the litigation showed Jackson's lead levels rising between 2010 and 2013, and plaintiffs alleged officials failed to prevent lead from entering the supply while falsely assuring residents the water was safe. The city has denied the allegations. The New American reports Jackson is more than 80 percent Black, and SSBCrack News reports the Mississippi State Department of Health found elevated lead levels in 2015 but did not inform residents for six months; SSBCrack also reports EPA tests in 2020 found "persistent and concerning violations" throughout the system. Bloomberg Law News reports city attorney Clarence Webster called the decision one of the most significant constitutional rulings the Fifth Circuit will issue this year.

Judge Catharina Haynes, a George W. Bush appointee, dissented in part and concurred in part, joined by four other judges. She argued that at this stage of litigation the plaintiffs' well-pleaded allegations must be accepted as true, and that they mirror "one of the worst public health crises in recent American history — the Flint water crisis." Haynes said the residents plausibly alleged a state-created danger claim, a doctrine ten other federal appeals courts have adopted in some form, while noting the Fifth Circuit "stands practically alone in its decades-long fence-sitting." Bloomberg Law News reports the Camp Mystic flood victims' parents had also urged the circuit to adopt the doctrine.

The majority pointed residents away from the Constitution and toward other remedies: state tort claims, electing officials who will better manage the water system, petitioning representatives, and regulators. The court acknowledged accurate information might have allowed residents to obtain drinking water elsewhere, but said that did not make the misinformation a 14th Amendment violation. USA Today notes that while clean water appears in neither the US nor Mississippi constitutions, several states — California and Virginia by USA Today's account, with SSBCrack also citing New York and Massachusetts — have protected access to safe water. SSBCrack additionally reports countries including Uruguay and South Africa enshrine the right to clean water constitutionally.

The ruling drew immediate backlash online, with The Nerd Stash reporting critics argued clean water is a natural right beyond legal doctrine, while defenders said the question belongs to lawmakers and environmental laws rather than constitutional litigation. The case resonates in a city where, per SSBCrack, roughly a quarter of the population is children especially vulnerable to irreversible lead effects, and plaintiff Priscilla Sterling's children were diagnosed with lead poisoning.