Free Republic

BISMARCK, N.D. — A federal judge in North Dakota on Thursday blocked a new Obama administration rule that would give the federal government jurisdiction over some state waterways. U.S. District Judge Ralph Erickson of North Dakota issued a temporary injunction against a the rule, which gives the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and Army Corps of Engineers authority to protect some streams, tributaries and wetlands under the Clean Water Act. The rule was scheduled to take effect Friday. “The risk of irreparable harm to the states is both imminent and likely,” Judge Erickson said in blocking the rule from taking effect....

A federal judge has ruled that a controversial regulation that would give the Environmental Protection Agency jurisdiction over small streams and ditches is bureaucratic overreach and has halted the implementation of the rule. The judge was not pleased with the EPA, who said they would go ahead and implement the regulation in the 37 states that did not sue to end it.

Control the water, control the land This is the largest, illegal, private property land grab in U.S. history Good EPA “laws” (read: “rules”, “regulations”) are long extinct, but if you had to pick one it would be the 1972 Clean Water Act (CWA) passed by congress four years after the Cuyahoga River in Ohio caught fire (Images for cuyahoga river fire burning—it wasn’t the first time) because of the pollution in it. The Act authorized the clean-up of this kind of mess in America’s navigable lakes, rivers, and streams, and prohibited further dumping of dangerous industrial chemicals, waste, and other...