Posted on 01/06/2012 2:00:01 PM PST by WilliamIII
WASHINGTON — An Idaho couple's dream home will be the center of a legal storm Monday at the Supreme Court.
For homebuilders, farmers and major corporations, the case called Sackett v. Environmental Protection Agency resonates well beyond one person's ambitions or even the wetlands protections specifically at issue. Business groups reckon the case can help roll back federal regulations along a broader front.
"The Clean Water Act has, in short, become a tool for regulators to micromanage even the most routine decisions of farmers and ranchers," attorney Mark Stancil wrote in a brief filed for the American Farm Bureau Federation.
Tellingly, 13 of the 14 friend-of-the-court briefs filed in the case side with Michael and Chantell Sackett. In a statement on the case, the Natural Resources Defense Council characterized the Sacketts' legal allies as "industry giants."
In sum, the Sacketts and their business allies want more leeway to challenge EPA orders.
(Excerpt) Read more at newsobserver.com ...
The crux of the case is the EPA sends a nastygram threatening onerous fines got building somewhere the EPA disapproves and then, if the builders sue, claim they have no legal standing because the fine was never issued.
In other words, the EPA gets to bully people into compliance and then dares you to defy them and be fined before you have a case.
What the plaintiffs want is the right to sue the EPA just for being threatened without it reaching the point of a violation and a fine.
Are they taking donations yet?
Thanks for posting this....I have been following this story with keen interest
My bet is they win and the EPA basically ignores the court ruling....
Owning property is the most fundamental freedoms we enjoy....take that away and the whole system of liberty collapses eventually
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