Posted on 07/30/2010 2:27:02 PM PDT by Andrea19
Whoever said, Sticks and stones can break my bones but words can never hurt me, never met Congressman James Oberstar (D-Minn). His bill, Americas Commitment to Clean Water Act (H.R. 5088), would remove the word navigable from the Clean Water Acts definition. By removing this one word, the federal governments regulatory authority over private property would increase exponentially.
The implications of this bill on individual property rights are frightening. By removing the word navigable, the government could regulate every body of water in the U.S. from small ponds to irrigation canals. Bureaucrats could impose onerous new restrictions and permit requirements that would hamper economic growth, especially for small businesses.
Owners of desert property would be the only ones truly safe from this bill, except for the fact that the government already owns most of the deserts in America...
(Excerpt) Read more at propertyrightsalliance.org ...
I checked several years ago and the Feds were regulating Scotts Creek in Jackson County, NC. Last time I was trout fishing in it the water was knee deep or less nearly everywhere.
Navigable by canoe only.
Also, with the riparian amendments, they are now controlling farmland within 50 feet of the creeks & rivers.
Commercial navigation would be the only link to federal regulation that could pass constitutional muster under the Commerce Claus (the be all and end all for Fed regulation).
That was my point; it should NOT qualify for regulation. I’ve searched on the internet for documentation about this (Scotts Creek) but could find nothing. The article must have been in our local paper several years ago.
The point is that the Commerce Clause, like the Right to Privacy, has been extended so far beyond common sense in order to justify Federal intrusion into private or at most State issues.
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