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Originally posted by sdy:
https://hotair.com/ed-morrisse...-the-us-case-n553404

In an opinion authored by Justice Samuel Alito in the case known as Sackett v. EPA, the high court found that the agency’s interpretation of the wetlands covered under the Clean Water Act is “inconsistent” with the law’s text and structure, and the law extends only to “wetlands with a continuous surface connection to bodies of water that are ‘waters of the United States’ in their own right.”

In this case, which has been percolating for years, the Obama-era EPA had defined the term “wetland” in the Clean Water Act and Waters of the US rule (WOTUS) as basically any land where water naturally pooled on occasion. That led the EPA in 2004 to block Mike and Chantell Sackett from completing a home on their residential-zoned Idaho lot of less than an acre and socking them with massive per-day fines until they dismantled what had already been built — even though their land was nowhere near a navigable body of water, as the WOTUS rule required

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Originally posted by Loswsmith:
The case is 19 years in the making. And while Obama is guilty of plenty of sins, running the EPA in 2004 is not one of them. This was the product of the Bush EPA's action and enforcement, at least at inception.

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Originally posted by stoic-one:

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Originally posted by Loswsmith:

In that case, can we go back a bitch slap Nixon for creating it in the first place?

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Geraldine Tyler’s day in court
The Supreme Court heard the case of Geraldine Tyler v. Hennepin County yesterday. C-SPAN has posted audio of oral argument in the Supreme Court here. The Eighth Circuit decision in the case — the one that the Supreme Court accepted for review — is posted online here.

Hennepin County consists mostly of the sinkhole of Minneapolis. It is the sinkhole in our back yard, and yet we haven’t gotten around to the case yet. I’m sorry about that.

The case involves a 94-year-old grandmother on whose one-bedroom condo the county foreclosed for nonpayment of $2300 in taxes. The county tacked on interest, fees, and other penalties until the total bill reached $15,000 in 2015. The county then seized Ms. Tyler’s condo and sold it for $40,000. Instead of keeping the $15,000 it was owed and refunding the surplus to Ms. Tyler, the county kept the change — some $25,000.

The county was able to victimize Ms. Tyler courtesy of Minnesota law. The “home equity theft,” as the Pacific Legal Foundation calls it, is blessed by the applicable Minnesota forfeiture statute.

Christina Martin of the foundation represents Ms. Tyler. The PLF page on the case is posted online here. The foundation provided me Ms. Martin’s statement on the case yesterday in response to my inquiry: “If you owe the government money, you should pay your debt. But the government shouldn’t be able to take more than what you owe. When the government takes more than it is owed, it violates Constitution’s promise that government will pay just compensation when it takes private property for a public use. We hope the Supreme Court puts an end to such confiscatory tax laws once and for all.”

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Geraldine Tyler’s (good) day in court
I covered the Supreme Court oral argument in Geraldine Tyler v. Hennepin County last month in “Geraldine Tyler’s day in court.” The following week I stepped back for a broader view of the case in “Argumentum interruptum — live on FOX News!” In the latter post I wrote (link omitted):

Ms. Tyler lost in the district court and on appeal because the courts felt bound to apply the 1956 Supreme Court case Nelson v. City of New York. In the Supreme Court hearing, however, Hennepin County and attorney Neal Katyal took a beating. I think they are going to lose the case (my guess is 8-1). The Supreme Court justices do not think the Nelson case applies and they see Ms. Tyler as the victim of a Minnesota statute that authorized the county’s unconstitutional taking. I look forward to a happy ending to this chapter of the story.

Well, I was close. In the event, Ms. Tyler has prevailed 9-0. Chief Justice Roberts wrote the opinion for the Court. Justice Gorsuch filed a concurring opinion in which Justice Jackson joined. The Court’s decision is posted here.

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The Supreme Court justices do not think the Nelson case applies and they see Ms. Tyler as the victim of a Minnesota statute that authorized the county’s unconstitutional taking. I look forward to a happy ending to this chapter of the story.

Well, I was close. In the event, Ms. Tyler has prevailed 9-0. Chief Justice Roberts wrote the opinion for the Court. Justice Gorsuch filed a concurring opinion in which Justice Jackson joined. The Court’s decision is posted here.

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"This MAGA Supreme Court is continuing to erode our country's environmental laws," Schumer tweeted after the opinion was released.

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Originally posted by sdy:
It took nineteen years for common sense to prevail. God bless the Sacketts, who have persevered for justice for two decades against a bureaucracy that values power over the rule of law, and against a Congress that couldn’t be bothered to rein in an out-of-control agency it authorizes.