For residents of Jackson, Mississippi, the question is simple yet difficult to answer: can people expect the water flowing from their taps to be safe to drink? A federal appeals court has now delivered a striking legal answer: not as a constitutional right. The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the US Constitution does not guarantee Americans a right to clean drinking water, rejecting a lawsuit brought by residents of Jackson over years of problems with the city’s water system. The decision upheld a lower court’s dismissal of the case.
The case was brought by a group of Jackson residents in 2022, who alleged that the city allowed lead to enter the municipal water system and then lied to residents saying the water was safe, though they knew it was not. Jackson is home to roughly 150,000 people. Nearly a quarter of them are children under 18 who are particularly vulnerable to the potentially lifelong toxic impacts of lead exposure including seizures, lowered IQ, impaired brain development and even death. The city’s major water crisis in 2022 followed years of infrastructure and treatment problems. A November 2025 ruling by a three-judge panel of the Fifth U.S. However, on September 4, 2026, the full court ruled against the plaintiffs, stating that the court could not recognise two new constitutional rights, “the right to be free from exposure to contaminated water and the right to accurate information from public officials.
“Knowing what is in our water is fundamental to protecting public health,” Caroline Leary, general counsel at the U.S.-based nonprofit Environmental Working Group, told Mongabay by email. The Fifth Circuit’s majority said the plaintiffs were effectively asking the judiciary to establish new constitutional rights that do not have a foundation in the nation’s legal history and tradition. The court stated that the Constitution does not guarantee clean water and said municipalities are not constitutionally required to provide water treatment, sewerage or waste-management services in a reasonably competent manner.
The plaintiffs alleged that several of their children have been diagnosed with lead poisoning and now require special educational, medical, sociological, occupational and disability services. The plaintiffs also argued that exposure to contaminated water and the failure to be informed about the risks violated their 14th Amendment due process right to bodily integrity. Jackson’s water system has faced serious problems for years. Residents have dealt with boil-water advisories, low water pressure and periods when water was unavailable altogether. The residents’ legal argument went beyond saying that officials had failed in their duties. They sought recognition of a constitutional right to be protected from contaminated water and a constitutional right to receive accurate information from public officials about the condition of their water. Circuit Court of Appeals allowed these claims against the city to proceed.