{"id":16399,"date":"2021-09-03T22:18:44","date_gmt":"2021-09-04T02:18:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/?p=16399"},"modified":"2021-09-04T11:05:59","modified_gmt":"2021-09-04T15:05:59","slug":"more-wetlands-purgatory-for-american-landowners","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/2021\/09\/03\/more-wetlands-purgatory-for-american-landowners\/","title":{"rendered":"More Wetlands Purgatory for American Landowners"},"content":{"rendered":"
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American Institute for Economic Research, September 3, 2021<\/h3>\n

More Wetlands Purgatory for American Landowners<\/a><\/h1>\n<\/header>\n
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\"JamesJames Bovard<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

How many drops of water does it take to justify federal bureaucrats commandeering your own land? Unfortunately, a federal judge changed the answer on Monday \u2013 the latest flip-flop in a saga stretching back more than 30 years and five presidencies.\u00a0 Federal wetlands policy epitomizes how Washington policymakers don\u2019t give a damn about safeguarding Americans\u2019 rights with clear rules to curb bureaucratic tyranny.<\/strong><\/p>\n

In 1972, Congress passed the Clean Water Act<\/a> to, among other things, restrict the pollution of navigable waters. That law gave the Army Corps of Engineers the power to approve or deny building permits, and the EPA received the power to veto Army Corps permits. In 1975, a federal judge revealed that the Clean Water Act also applied to wetlands that were adjacent to navigable waters.<\/p>\n

In 1988, Presidential candidate George H.W. Bush declared that \u201call existing wetlands, no matter how small, should be preserved\u201d and promised \u201cno net loss\u201d of wetlands if elected president. On January 21, 1989, the day after Bush\u2019s inauguration, the EPA and the Army Corps revealed a new and vastly broader definition of wetlands. Land that was dry 350 days a year could be classified as a \u201cfederal jurisdictional wetland.\u201d Fairness to Land Owners, a Maryland advocacy group, estimated that the new definition magically increased the amount of wetlands in the U.S. from roughly 100 million acres to 200 million acres, the vast majority owned by private citizens.<\/p>\n

Federal bureaucrats concocted bizarre rules to vastly expand their own power over landowners, including the \u201cglancing geese\u201d test. If migrating geese glance down and consider stopping at a water hole, and the geese are on a flight that crosses state lines, then federal agencies automatically have jurisdiction over that water hole and the surrounding land.<\/strong> In a 1992 decision striking down an EPA penalty on a Chicago-area homebuilder, federal judge Daniel Manion declared, \u201cThe EPA claims jurisdiction over the intrastate wetland solely on the ground that migratory birds could, potentially, use the wetland as a place to feed, or nest or as a stopover on the way to the Gulf States for the winter months\u201d but \u201cthere is not even any evidence that migratory birds, or any other wildlife, actually used [the area] for any purpose.\u201d A federal appeals court decision narrowed Manion\u2019s ruling and permitted the EPA to retain its \u201cglancing geese\u201d test.<\/p>\n

Congress specified in the Clean Water Act that normal farming practices and operations should be exempt from federal wetlands restrictions. But the Army Corps of Engineers evaded that restraint by issuing a \u201cclarification\u201d of federal law that announced that, from the Corps\u2019 perspective, cranberries, apples, blueberries, hay, and alfalfa are not agricultural commodities \u2014 and thus that those farmers were subject to the Corps\u2019 control.<\/p>\n

In 1993, the Clinton administration issued new guidance that banned any activity with \u201cenvironmental concern\u201d on wetlands. A federal attorney declared that, under the new policy, the Army Corps \u201ccould require a permit to ride a bicycle across a wetland.\u201d A White House press release suggested that \u201cCongress should amend the Clean Water Act to make it consistent with the agencies\u2019 rulemaking.\u201d That was a novel perspective on the Constitution, which previously required federal regulations to comply with laws that Congress actually passed.<\/p>\n

Thanks to the Clinton regs, the Army Corps and the EPA imposed controls over sections of a development as small as 26 square feet \u2014 roughly half the size of a ping-pong table. One Rhode Island town was forced to wait for almost two years to get federal permission to do mosquito-control work on 0.009 acres of wetlands. Asserting federal jurisdiction over a tiny area could effectively prohibit the owner from building on a much greater portion of his property. The legal costs of getting government permission to build on or near suspected wetlands easily exceeded $50,000 \u2014 a prohibitive cost for most individual landowners.<\/p>\n

Former Justice Department attorney William Laffer observed, \u201cAny time the Army Corps or EPA thinks a parcel of land is beneficial to wildlife, they arbitrarily apply the wetlands definition to prohibit the owner from using the land.\u201d Rep. James Hayes (R-LA) complained, \u201cIn Nevada, [housing] developments in the midst of cactus and parched earth are now being classified as \u2018wetlands\u2019 because standing water can occur for seven days in a hole dug for a foundation.\u201d The Congressional Budget Office estimated that it would cost at least $10 billion to compensate owners for the loss of their property values as a result of wetlands rulings. However, with the way bureaucrats rig the game, property owners were denied even a single dollar of compensation after being banned from using their land.<\/p>\n

Wetlands policy became little more than institutionalized lawlessness.<\/strong> In December 1997, a federal appeals court overturned a landowner\u2019s conviction, ruling that \u201cthe Corps\u2019 [sic] regulation of such wetlands is based solely on its definition of wetlands as \u2018waters of the United States\u2019\u201d \u2014 for which the court found no basis in the Clean Water Act. Five months later, the EPA and Army Corps issued a guidance memo detailing their plans to evade the court decision. Agency personnel were told to completely disregard the decision in any area outside of the jurisdiction of the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals (i.e., Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland, North Carolina, and South Carolina). Even within those states, the EPA and Army Corps planned to continue prohibiting owners from using their land when the feds claimed the land would be used \u201cby migratory waterfowl, other game birds\u2026 sought by hunters, bird watchers, or photographers.\u201d According to the Clinton administration, it took only a few clicks of a camera to nullify property rights.<\/p>\n

In 2012, the Supreme Court struck down a key provision in the regulatory regime, declaring that there was no reason to believe that \u201cthe Clean Water Act was uniquely designed to enable the strong-arming of regulated parties [property owners] into \u2018voluntary compliance\u2019 without the opportunity for judicial review.\u2019\u2019 In comments to the media when he announced the Court\u2019s decision, Justice Antonin Scalia mocked the EPA\u2019s definition of \u201cwetlands,\u201d noting that the Idaho homeowners had never \u201cseen a ship or other vessel cross their yard.\u201d Justice Samuel Alito, in a concurring opinion, declared, \u201cThe reach of the Clean Water Act is notoriously unclear<\/a>,\u201d and its harsh penalties \u201cleaves most property owners with little practical alternative but to dance to the EPA\u2019s tune.\u201d Alito urged Congress to clarify the legal definition of \u201cwetlands\u201d \u2014 and thus to set a limit once and for all to federal regulators\u2019 controls over private landowners.<\/p>\n

Congress failed to clarify the law. In 2015, the Obama administration issued its \u201cClean Water Rule<\/a>,\u201d perpetuating arbitrary federal jurisdiction over wet spots across the nation. In 2019, the Trump administration issued new regulatory guidance titled the Navigable Waters Protection Rule (NWPR), curtailing the power of federal agencies. This past June, the Biden administration announced its conclusion that the Trump-era rules were \u201cleading to significant environmental degradation.\u201d Jaime Pinkham, acting assistant secretary of the Army for civil works, announced, \u201cCommunities deserve to have our nation\u2019s waters protected<\/a>.\u201d Thus, there was supposedly no alternative to reimposing the regulatory straitjacket on America\u2019s property owners. A Politico<\/em> analysis noted that Biden appointees sought a new policy \u201cinformed by lessons from the previous whipsaw of regulations<\/a>.\u201d Politico<\/em> reported that \u201cit\u2019s unclear what will happen to the thousands of jurisdictional determinations that have already been made under the narrower Trump rule\u201d permitting landowners to build or modify their property but that \u201creversing them is a top priority for environmental groups.\u201d<\/p>\n

On Monday, federal judge Rosemary M\u00e1rquez condemned the Trump-era wetland rules for \u201cfundamental, substantive flaws,\u201d vacating the 2019 policy in part because of \u201cthe likelihood that the [Biden administration] Agencies will alter the NWPR\u2019s definition<\/a> of \u2018waters of the United States.\u2019\u201d An attorney for Earthjustice, which filed the lawsuit, boasted, \u201cWe came in and said, \u2018No, no, no, no, you can\u2019t leave this in place.\u2019 This is hugely good<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the 1950s, liberals spurred a backlash against Sen. Joseph McCarthy by highlighting cases of innocent individuals who had lost their jobs as a result of his baseless accusations of communism. Vastly more Americans have lost their livelihoods as a result of federal wetlands prohibitions imposed on landowners with the flimsiest of legal pretexts. Yet there has been little uproar \u2014 and scant attention on Capitol Hill \u2014 over how bureaucratic tyranny is wrecking the lives of landowners.<\/p>\n

Perhaps the best acronym for Biden\u2019s pending wetland regs will be WBTP \u2013 for \u201cWelcome Back to Purgatory.\u201d Almost 30 years ago, federal Judge Roger Vinson denounced the federal government\u2019s wetlands interpretations as a \u201cregulatory hydra \u2026 worthy of Alice in Wonderland.\u201d Nobody in Washington has cared enough to slay the hydra. Wetlands policy vivifies how the Fifth Amendment\u2019s proviso that property cannot be taken \u201cwithout due process of law\u201d is void when bureaucrats are unleashed.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

American Institute for Economic Research, September 3, 2021 More Wetlands Purgatory for American Landowners James Bovard How many drops of water does it take to justify federal bureaucrats commandeering your own land? Unfortunately, a federal judge changed the answer on Monday \u2013 the latest flip-flop in a saga stretching back more than 30 years and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16400,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[2995,2124,51,2996,785,1819,241,708,786,2997,2994],"class_list":["post-16399","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-army-corps-of-engineers","tag-biden","tag-clinton","tag-daniel-manion","tag-epa","tag-george-h-w-bush","tag-property-rights","tag-trump","tag-wetlands","tag-william-laffer","tag-wotus"],"yoast_head":"\nMore Wetlands Purgatory for American Landowners - James Bovard<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Federal judge's decree means more purgatory for landowners facing arbitrary federal decrees with no basis in law\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/2021\/09\/03\/more-wetlands-purgatory-for-american-landowners\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"More Wetlands Purgatory for American Landowners - James Bovard\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Federal judge's decree means more purgatory for landowners facing arbitrary federal decrees with no basis in law\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/2021\/09\/03\/more-wetlands-purgatory-for-american-landowners\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"James Bovard\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:author\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/jim.bovard\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2021-09-04T02:18:44+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2021-09-04T15:05:59+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/lockedland-1200x762-1.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1200\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"762\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Jim\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@jimbovard\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Jim\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"7 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/jimbovard.com\\\/blog\\\/2021\\\/09\\\/03\\\/more-wetlands-purgatory-for-american-landowners\\\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/jimbovard.com\\\/blog\\\/2021\\\/09\\\/03\\\/more-wetlands-purgatory-for-american-landowners\\\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Jim\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/jimbovard.com\\\/blog\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/79550830ad81c14be529a2c37469974f\"},\"headline\":\"More Wetlands Purgatory for American Landowners\",\"datePublished\":\"2021-09-04T02:18:44+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2021-09-04T15:05:59+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/jimbovard.com\\\/blog\\\/2021\\\/09\\\/03\\\/more-wetlands-purgatory-for-american-landowners\\\/\"},\"wordCount\":1483,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/jimbovard.com\\\/blog\\\/2021\\\/09\\\/03\\\/more-wetlands-purgatory-for-american-landowners\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/jimbovard.com\\\/blog\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2021\\\/09\\\/lockedland-1200x762-1.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Army Corps of Engineers\",\"Biden\",\"Clinton\",\"Daniel Manion\",\"EPA\",\"George H.W. 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The Wall Street Journal called Bovard \\\"the roving inspector general of the modern state\\\" and Washington Post columnist George Will called him a \\\"one-man truth squad.\\\" His 1994 book, Lost Rights: The Destruction of American Liberty, received the Free Press Association\u2019s Mencken Award as Book of the Year. His Terrorism & Tyranny won the Lysander Spooner \\\"Best Book on Liberty in 2003\\\" award. He received the Thomas Szasz Award for Civil Liberties work, awarded by the Center for Independent Thought and the Freedom Fund Award from the Firearms Civil Rights Defense Fund of the National Rifle Association. 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The Wall Street Journal called Bovard \"the roving inspector general of the modern state\" and Washington Post columnist George Will called him a \"one-man truth squad.\" His 1994 book, Lost Rights: The Destruction of American Liberty, received the Free Press Association\u2019s Mencken Award as Book of the Year. His Terrorism & Tyranny won the Lysander Spooner \"Best Book on Liberty in 2003\" award. He received the Thomas Szasz Award for Civil Liberties work, awarded by the Center for Independent Thought and the Freedom Fund Award from the Firearms Civil Rights Defense Fund of the National Rifle Association. 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