872
Opinion of the Court
on the question whether the term "coal" in the 1909 and 1910 Acts "unambiguously excludes or includes CBM." 151 F. 3d, at 1256. Over a dissenting opinion by Judge Tacha, joined by two other judges, the en banc court agreed with the panel. Ibid. The court held that the term "coal" was ambiguous. Ibid. It invoked the interpretive canon that ambiguities in land grants should be resolved in favor of the sovereign and concluded that the coal reservation encompassed CBM gas. Ibid.
The United States did not petition for, or participate in, the rehearing en banc. Instead, it filed a supplemental brief explaining that the Solicitor of the Interior was reconsidering the 1981 Solicitor's opinion in light of the panel's decision. Brief for Federal Respondents 14, n. 8. On the day the federal respondents' response to petitioners' certiorari petition was due, see id., at 47, n. 37, the Solicitor of the Interior withdrew the 1981 opinion in a one-line order, see Addendum to Brief for Federal Respondents in Opposition 1a. The federal respondents now support the Tribe's position that CBM gas is coal reserved by the 1909 and 1910 Acts.
II
We begin our discussion as the parties did, with a brief overview of the chemistry and composition of coal. Coal is a heterogeneous, noncrystalline sedimentary rock composed primarily of carbonaceous materials. See, e. g., Gorbaty & Larsen, Coal Structure and Reactivity, in 3 Encyclopedia of Physical Science and Technology 437 (R. Meyers ed. 2d ed. 1992). It is formed over millions of years from decaying plant material that settles on the bottom of swamps and is converted by microbiological processes into peat. D. Van Krevelen, Coal 90 (3d ed. 1993). Over time, the resulting peat beds are buried by sedimentary deposits. Id., at 91. As the beds sink deeper and deeper into the earth's crust, the peat is transformed by chemical reactions which increase the carbon content of the fossilized plant material. Ibid.
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