Volume 479 — Federal Reporter, Third Series

Navajo Nation v. United States Forest Service, 479 F.3d 1024 (9th Cir. 2007), reversed after rehearing en banc, 535 F.3d 1058 (9th Cir. 2008) was brought to the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in 2007. It was a case that was brought about by previous cases dealing with the expansion of the Snowbowl ski resort on the government-owned sacred lands of the Navajo peoples located in northern Arizona. In Navajo Nation v. U.S. Forest Service, the conflict escalated with the Federal government's use of artificial snow containing treated sewage on the sacred San Francisco Peaks, an area that is owned by the Federal government. The Navajo people, along with twelve other nations, made the appeal, citing that the use of sewage water violated the Religious Freedom Restoration Act.