Posted on 01/09/2012 6:55:59 PM PST by tobyhill
Since 2007, Mike and Chantell Sackett have been fighting to build their dream home on the Idaho lot they bought years ago. The Sacketts say they had gotten local permits and spent thousands prepping the land for construction - then the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) showed up.
The EPA told the Sacketts their property contained wetlands and issued a compliance order mandating that they return it to its original state or risk facing fines starting at $37,500 per day.
The Sacketts say they were stunned, and asked the EPA for a hearing on the matter. The agency denied their request, so the Sacketts decided to file a lawsuit. The EPA has argued that the agency is equipped to handle complaints like the Sacketts through administrative procedures, and that landowners have no constitutional right to proceed from a compliance order directly into federal court.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
I’d love to see the EPA Nazis get what they’ve got coming to them but it won’t happen in Barry’s Amerika with Barry’s courts.
Bush’s fault!
The EPA (thanks go to RMN, as I recall) has no Consitutional basis,save the “general welfare” clause which is just the preamble and not an article with legal weight.
It needs to be dissolved and the occupants sent hiking.
Ping.
Isn’t all of DC built on what would have been called ‘wetlands?’
Much is built on drained and filled land, but it's still a dismal swamp.
When Congress passed the Environmental Protection Act, they claimed authority under the Commerce Clause, claiming to find that air pollution has a "substantial effect on interstate commerce".
This "substantial effects" doctrine started under FDR, beginning with Wickard v Filburn and the AAA.
We need to overturn Wickard, and get rid of everything Congress has done that relies solely on these claims of "finding a substantial effect on interstate commerce".
Dismal swamp, indeed. I was just told by my resident expert that the area where the Mall is had been swampland (who’d have guessed?) with a creek, Tiber Creek, running thru it.
Why do I think the EPA as it is today isn’t what Nixon had in mind when he started it. It’s true, we did need to clean our air and waterways back then. But it’s gotten insane. Hope this couple wins at SCOTUS to end the madness.
Yea, the same crap that said a farmer growing corn for his own cattle affected interstate commerce...
I agree that air blows from state to state. If one state started burning trash and affected another state or it’s waterways the courts should be able to handle it- we don’t need an agency shoving bullshit down everyone’s throat and strangling business, IMHO.
“We need to overturn Wickard, and get rid of everything Congress has done that relies solely on these claims of “finding a substantial effect on interstate commerce”. “
Not gonna happen. There is too much riding on maintaining Wickard.
“The Natural Resources Defense Council, writing a brief in support of the EPA, said that the Sacketts “should not be rewarded for failing to utilize the multiple administrative processes that they could (and should) have followed to achieve a resolution of their concerns.””
IOW they should just file the paperwork in our agency and accept our decision.
These gov’t people are out of control.
As long as we believe that, it will be true. The federal government has assumed that power, and there are people who don't want the States to ever have it back, so they don't want anyone to believe it's possible. I will not be one of them.
If there must be war, let it be, but let it be for the Constitution.
“As long as we believe that, it will be true”
You miss the point.
It’s not the leftists that have to be defeated on this issue, it’s the conservatives that would have to have a change of heart. They agree with Wickard, so they are not likely to go along with you.
A conservative that doesn't believe in holding to the original intent of the Constitution would be oxymoronic. If you believe that the Constitution is a "living document" that means whatever we want it to mean then there is nothing to conserve. It will all be brand new tomorrow.
“A conservative that doesn’t believe in holding to the original intent of the Constitution would be oxymoronic.”
Agreed.
You’ve been here awhile. Surely you’ve realized that many supposed conservatives on FR are really no different than liberals; both groups believe it’s acceptable to use the power of gov’t to create the type of society they desire. Neither really believe in freedom.
This started in 2007, so yes, it is Bush’s fault...to the degree that any Prez has control over the Lefties infiltrating the Federal Bureaucracies
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