-
Disabling American Sovereignty
May 22, 2013 | 13 comments
-
Another Correa Problem
April 15, 2013 | 9 comments
-
The Lady Wasn’t for Turning
April 8, 2013 | 20 comments
-
Let’s Lose LOST
March 26, 2013 | 25 comments
-
The Missing Word on Trade
February 15, 2013 | 4 comments
The Environmental Spectator
EPA Jackboots?
Lisa Jackson may not know that property rights under common law offered greater protection from polluters than do diktats from Washington bureaucrats.
When Environmental Protection Agency head Lisa Jackson recently ridiculed her opponents as thinking of EPA officials as “jack-booted thugs,” she should have thought through exactly why so many Republican candidates are calling for the abolition of the EPA — and getting applause for it. The fact is that many do view the EPA as trampling on their rights. Yet Jackson would have us believe that the alternative to the EPA as currently constituted is environmental degradation and pollution as far as the eye can see. The fact is that we can balance the concerns of civil liberty and environmental protection without the EPA, regardless of whether the agency officials wear jackboots or loafers.
How would we ensure environmental protection in the absence of a $10 billion bureaucracy? Returning to the principles of the American Founding provide the answer to how to make this rogue agency accountable. Moreover, it can validate a free market approach more broadly by showing how progressive policies helped cause environmental degradation in the first place.
For much of U.S. history, clean air and water were protected by the courts. This common law system based environmental protection on property rights. No one had the right to damage another person’s property, including his land, air, and water. Polluters were held accountable in the same way as trespassers, vandals, and thieves.
The common law was better for victims because it granted them direct legal recourse against polluters. No new law or regulation needed to be issued. They only had to demonstrate that the pollutant resulted in damage. For that reason, it was also good for businesses, who were not subject to regulation unless they actually imposed costs on others. Both sides also benefited from the ability to negotiate. Firms could offer to pay plaintiffs to allow a certain amount of pollution on their property, which created a natural rather than artificial price for pollution, such as cap and trade policies seek to create.
The 1951 case International Paper Company v. Maddox demonstrates all these benefits. In the 1930s, International Paper built a paper mill along Bodcaw Bayou, Louisiana. It paid 40 landowners downstream several hundred thousand dollars for the right to discharge wastewater. Mr. Maddox ran a fishing camp about 40 miles downstream. When the pollution began to hurt his business, he sued for his loss in property value and business revenue. The court acknowledged that IP had improved its pollution control measures, but still awarded Maddox damages, a verdict upheld on appeal.
In case after case, courts affirmed plaintiffs’ right to live pollution free. The EPA did away with this direct legal recourse. Consider the 1972 case of Illinois v. Milwaukee. Throughout the 1960s, Milwaukee and three other Wisconsin cities had substantially polluted Lake Michigan, on which Chicago relied for drinking water. When Illinois sued on Chicago’s behalf, the Supreme Court issued an injunction against Milwaukee saying, “[A] State with high water quality standards may well ask… that it not be compelled to lower itself to the more degrading standards of a neighbor.” The Clean Water Act changed all that by granting the EPA the exclusive authority to regulate. After it passed, the Supreme Court vacated its order, and Milwaukee continued to pollute.
Environmentalists often claim that the common law system failed. They point to cities like Pittsburgh where during the 1940s pollution was so bad it caused gastroenteritis outbreaks along the river. But these problems, like so many others, resulted from a lack of clear property rights, not a lack of regulation. The river was open-access and cities all along it dumped their sewage and pollution at no cost. When a river basin association was formed in the 1940s, the river was divided, and pollution was reduced dramatically.
The infamous Cuyahoga river fires were caused by the City of Cleveland using the river as a municipal dump. When paper mills, which need clean water to operate effectively, tried to sue to protect their right to clean water, the courts told them that the city and state’s rights to foul the water trumped theirs.
Property rights prevent these “tragedies of the commons,” while agencies like the EPA help create them, because their regulations displace the common law requirement that plaintiffs must demonstrate pollution has caused harm. Government should protect the rights of individuals and a clean environment is certainly one of those rights, but the EPA all too often ends up hurting the environment by protecting polluters or punishing businesses for harmless activities.
For the past thirty years, the EPA has used every power at its disposal to pursue John Pozsgai, a refugee from communism, for the crime of cleaning up a scrap yard he had bought. At one point, they succeeded in sending him to prison, something that has never happened as a result of a true environmental disaster like the BP oil spill. More recently, the EPA has specialized in subverting Congress, by asserting authority where it has none, such as in the matter of setting national fuel efficiency standards, which Congress entrusted to a different agency. The agency seems to have decided that it is above the law.
Limited government is important precisely because it protects “little guys” like Maddox and Pozsgai from the over-mighty state. They have a right to build their businesses free from pollution, but they also have a right to freedom from government intrusion. And we all have the right to expect agencies to follow the law. Oppression does not require jackbooted thugs, nor does environmental protection require an all-powerful bureaucracy.
About the Author
Iain Murray heads the Center for Economic Freedom at the Competitive Enterprise Institute and is the author of Stealing You Blind: How Government Fatcats Are Getting Rich Off of You.
Letter to the Editor View all comments (37) | Leave a comment
More Articles by Iain Murray
More Articles From The Environmental Spectator
http://spectator.org/archives/2011/11/10/epa-jackboots
Follow us:
ADVERTISEMENT
SPONSORED LINKS
FLASHBACK TO: 1995
-
Pope Culture
A man of faith in a godless age is hitting Americans where it hurts.
-
Why the GOP Does Not, Like, Totally Suck
Mr. and Mrs. American Spectator Reader, let P.J. O’Rourke talk sense to your kids.
-
Dames at Sea
-
In the Absence of Guns
In Britain, defending your property can get you life.
-
The Metaphysical Martini
-
Counting the Costs of Clintonism
The debacle of this president’s administration is both a cause and a symptom of the decline of American values. Unless Congress impeaches him, that decline will go on unchecked. An eminent jurist surveys the damage and assesses the chances for the recovery of our culture.
-
Chuck McHagel
It won’t take long for conservatives to scratch this presidential wannabe off their 2008 scorecard.
-
The Legacy of Old John and Mother Fresh-Roasted
-
It’s the Best Time of the Year
The American Christmas, like the songs that celebrate it, makes room for everybody under the rainbow. Is that why so many people seem to be hostile to it?
-
The Bush Crack-Up
Was the President done in by the economy, or by the politics of the economy?
Clip of the Day
H/T to National Review Online
ADVERTISEMENT
Tenn Slim| 11.10.11 @ 7:04AM
Wolf River, dumps into the Mississippi at MFS.
Polluted for years by a cotton seed milling plant upstream. Residents were affected mainly by the horrendous smell. Finally, a court appeal, a decision based on Smell Pollution only, closed the cotton seed plant, Wolf river naturally cleaned its own down stream pollution. Today, the area is mostly bounded by clean parks, fishing sites and access to improved living areas right on the delta of the river.
Circa 1950's, WAY before the EPA thuggery.
end
Semper FI
Bill Hussein O'Stalin| 11.10.11 @ 7:16AM
There are 17,000 elitists working at the EPA.
Fire them, close the agency and create 10 million jobs.
It's a no brainer which means Washington will miss out on the math. It's too simple to grasp.
Pecos Pete| 11.10.11 @ 7:53AM
Amen!
Bill Hussein O'Stalin| 11.10.11 @ 1:56PM
The EPA doesn't need jack boots when they have liberal Republicans:
http://thehill.com/blogs/e2-wi.....tles-await
The Senate on Thursday blocked Sen. Rand Paul’s (R-Ky.) bid to kill new EPA power plant pollution rules.
In a 41-56 vote, lawmakers thwarted Paul’s resolution to overturn the Cross-State Air Pollution Rule, which demands curbs in smog and particulate-forming pollution from plants in 27 states in the eastern half of the country.
Six Republicans voted with Democrats against the resolution. Centrist Democratic Sens. Joe Manchin (W.V.) and Ben Nelson (Neb.) joined Republicans in voting to overturn the rule.
The six Republicans who voted against the Paul resolution were Sens. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), Kelly Ayotte (N.H.), Scott Brown (Mass.), Susan Collins (Maine), Olympia Snowe (Maine) and Mark Kirk (Ill.)
c. j. acworth| 11.10.11 @ 7:31AM
I wonder if it is also important to note that under common-law, the "pollutee" gets to decide how much pollution he will accept from the "polluter". That is, if your farm is upstream from mine, and runoff is coming past my place from yours, we are allowed to reach an amicable solution as neighbors, with recourse to court as a last resort. Now, a faceless beaurocracy inserts itself between us and dictates what you must do, even if I do not believe myself to be injured. And of course, both our taxes go up to pay for the privilage of being bossed around!
TrueBlue| 11.10.11 @ 12:04PM
The Federal Government has gotten so large that those involved have forgotten they are there to serve us, not the other way around.
DTOM| 11.10.11 @ 8:08AM
Our household invested in a building that turned out to be somewhere near a US EPA Superfund clean up site. Apparently one bad actor had allowed chemicals to occasionally spill which eventually necessitated a big clean up. The building we built, unbeknownst to us, had had a completely unrelated minor issue which was "remediated." Our environmental consultant's Phase I study failed to identify either situation. A year after our investment, we received notice that we were considered Potentially Responsible Parties, this is what most people call "perps."
Now we and our commercial tenants never violated any regulations. The prior owner did. He cleaned up his problem to EPA's satisfaction, at the time. But since a number of adjacent homeowners had to switch from private wells to a city water system and there is fear twenty years after the clean up of the big problem that there may be some disease correlated to the big problem. We are not clear of this problem yet. We sold the building five years ago, with complete disclosure at a bargain price.
Today, that building was supposed to provide us with more than twice the income that SS would have provided. And the EPA and Justice Department are still insisting that the corporation we formed to hold the building keep about 20% of the building's sale price as a corporate asset, just in case something comes up.
Jack booted thugs? No it's lawyers making up problems so they can bill you to death!
Nothing is cleaner anywhere in the world - but half our investment went went to attorneys, theirs, ours, EPA's Justice Department, the neighbors. The EPA is nothing but a Full Employment for Lawyers Act. Thieving, useless scoundrels! And it's the EPA that makes it all possible.
Hell, McCarthy would not have been such a bad President!? Carter would never have gotten to square 1, and Eugene would never have been re-elected after he surrendered in Viet Nam. Stupid Tricky Dick!
DTOM| 11.10.11 @ 8:10AM
Oops, we bought the building - we didn't build it.
Moe Blotz| 11.10.11 @ 8:59AM
Here in New Juhsey the state DEP competes with the federal EPA to regulate businesses and residents to death.
russel| 11.10.11 @ 10:12AM
Here in Wyo. we do have an EPA problem , but more meddling and troublsome are the enviro nuts . One could reasonably switch the two entities and not recognize much difference . I read that it could be reality soon for a business to " get permission " from some enviro outfit before proceeding on any plan . The abolishment of the EPA , along with OSHA , would send business' airborne . These government crackpots are a waste of time and money . The courts have been used to settle infractions for decades ; just go ask an envirokook how it's done .
DatsunMark| 11.10.11 @ 10:18AM
It seems to me that a simple argument against the existance of the EPA is the 10th Admendment. Conservatives can argue effectively to abolish the EPA and block grant the money to the states. Let the Governors and voters of each state be accountable for their own environmental protection. So if California wants to be a *green* paradise...have at it. And their neighbor states can reap the reward.
TrueBlue| 11.10.11 @ 12:19PM
To heck with block grants from the federal government, or any other subsidies, ditch them all and lower my federal taxes. Let each state deal with it their own way. The Federal Government wants to make laws that require people do this or that for the environment, fine. But they better be voted on BY CONGRESS, not this bull$%^& unconstitutional appointed regulation agency with the power of law. The ONLY reason for the EPA to exist is to have a SMALL group of "environmental experts" to send SUGGESTIONS to Congress for possible laws for them to write up and pass or vote down.
JimH| 11.10.11 @ 1:11PM
Pollution does not respect borders. So there can be a Federal role, but as the article says, it should be done by enforcing property rights.
Petronius| 11.10.11 @ 10:24AM
Private Property is now an oxymoron unless one has the right connections inside the beltway. I blame Teddy Roosevelt for starting all this shit. In his time, he had thousands of acres all over this country posted under federal protection so that nobody could hunt, fish, or trap in those areas but him and his cronies. Guides and camps were put out of business and market hunting was outlawed. After 1970 the EPA shut down all the smokestack industry that employed the urban working class. Now all the cities east of the Mississippi are basket cases. We have clean air and water but the far east has the mills and the jobs. Thanks for nothin'!!
George S| 11.10.11 @ 10:55AM
This is why elections matter. Elect a Marxist and you get Marxists in tow at federal agencies. Elect constitutional conservatives and the EPA could possibly meet me as the new boss. Anything but same as the old boss. I would have the absolute discretion and authority to downsize, put in a lower budget requisition, and to shred all rules and regulations not specifically authored by Congress. That is the most effective way of doing it, and one more reason to ask: who would most likely do that -- Romney or Cain?
Purpleguy| 11.10.11 @ 10:58AM
Why has this site not addressed the overwhelming rejection of the GOP on Tuesday? Ohio, Iowa, Kentucky, Maine, Mississippi, Arizona to name a few rejected many initiatives and elected Democrats to Red State positions ... Could this be the harbinger of a Blue Wave in 2012? Hmmmm?
Boar Hunter| 11.10.11 @ 11:22AM
LOL, blue wave, thats a good one. Wave good buy to your lying, doper, racist, outlaw president Obumbler.
Purpleguy| 11.10.11 @ 11:32AM
So you don't know about or don't believe the total rejection of the GOP in Tuesday's elections... ? the name calling is childish.
Old Soldier| 11.10.11 @ 1:07PM
Obamacare rejected in Ohio?
Purpleguy| 11.11.11 @ 6:09PM
is that all you heard about from Fixed News? You need to get out more and listen to more variety... by not informing you, they are lying to you, of course. That's how they control you all.
TrueBlue| 11.10.11 @ 1:10PM
Ohio, the Union state? Anyone surprised the anti-collective bargaining law didn't pass there was deluding themselves. Those same people told Obama to shove his healthcare in the trash though, so it wasn't a total loss.
Mississippi and their anti-abortion law was never going to pass either. Too many people believe that it's not the government's decision on what a woman does to her body. While it's my belief that life begins at conception I also think that government (state or federal) needs to get the heck off the subject and let it go. If a woman wants to risk serious bodily injury to herself by having an abortion that is her choice, and between her and God. I still think the process needs to be explained beforehand, and make sure they understand ALL of the risks involved (neither of which tends to happen). Also, the law was too vague and left a lot of people wondering just how far it would go as far as punishing people or outlawing certain contraceptives.
Repubs also won seats in Virginia, just south of DC, and in a state that until recently voted pretty blue.
Kentucky and Mississipi governor spots were incumbents, they usually win (reelection rates are up around 75-80% historically), unless there is MAJOR bad feelings for them, like Obama...
Maine overturning an old law that required registration at least 2 days before voting was kind of silly. It prevented people who turned 18 on that day from voting for example. I can understand why some would want to keep it, same day registration does lend itself to people coming in and registering from out of state to try and influence elections, but at the same time, if voter fraud is going to happen, 2 days isn't going to make a difference. Also, a pretty solidly blue state.
The Arizona incumbent was beaten by another Republican, so not exactly a big win for Dems. Given how the law Mr Pearce was treated (especially the fact that all it did was allow local law enforcement to enforce FEDERAL immigration laws) I'm not surprised he lost. Opponents of the law spent millions across the country to slander it when the only thing different than current federal law was that it required police officers the check the immigration status of anyone they detained and suspected of being illegal. If it merely authorized them to do so instead of requiring it the provision wouldn't have been thrown out by the courts, and probably wouldn't have done Mr. Pearce's career serious harm.
Which Dems to Red State positions were you talking about exactly? If you mean Iowa, that state is not Red, it's a blue state, and has been for a long time (though it has been SLOWLY going back the other way). Also, the seat was previously Democrat owned, so it's not like anything actually changed in the Iowa senate. Frankly, given what Mathis SAYS (now to see if she follows through) I probably would have voted for her too. Party affiliation is only a base level indicator for a candidate, some actually listen to the words spoken and actions taken. Giving Iowa companies first crack at state and local contracts; cutting small business property taxes by $300 million; offering businesses a $2,000 tax credit for each new Iowa hire; more tax incentives to attract high-tech employers; and stopping "cuts to our classrooms" (not sure on specifics to that last one given how that phrase tends to mean more pay for teachers).
Those are some significant changes right there...
Moe Blotz| 11.10.11 @ 1:51PM
Very good response to that purple hose head. He has gone to every essay on TAS and logged the same question.
TrueBlue| 11.10.11 @ 2:03PM
Thanks. I've noticed he did that, I just refuse to waste my time reposting it on each one.
Purpleguy| 11.11.11 @ 6:14PM
Well, they didn't even mention any problem for the GOP, now did they? Don't you wonder what you're missing - ever?
Purpleguy| 11.11.11 @ 6:11PM
Well at least there is one brain on this site...
Good response, but the GOP wave of 2010 is behind us, now isn't it? That was the main point.
victor| 11.12.11 @ 1:02PM
PurpleSlurple:
" the GOP wave of 2010 is behind us"
As the new meme of the left is repeated an nauseum.
You are wishin' and a hopin' that this would be true.
When things are put into perspective, things are better understood and there's no problem either.
Od year elections are always state and local races and some questions.
You still have the problem of having Obama in the White House, a man who knows nuthin' bout nuthin'.
That's why you're so hepped up on smearing Herman Cain.
A man who not only knows stuff, but has done stuff as well.
Gonna be hard promoting a know nothing and do nothing president.
Brian B| 11.10.11 @ 11:50AM
--So you don't know about or don't believe the total rejection of the GOP in Tuesday's elections... ?--
You mean like the Mississippi and Virginia governments turning to Republican majorities?
Ed| 11.10.11 @ 12:09PM
Sci-fi author Robert A. Heinlein had a creative solution to water pollution. Require factories and cities to place their water intake pipes downstream of of their water outlet pipes.
TrueBlue| 11.10.11 @ 1:11PM
Good one!
Steve| 11.10.11 @ 1:08PM
I might add that the settlement of any lawsuits went to the damaged party and not the Government. I have no, zero, nada faith the government to protect my interests.
PattyMor| 11.10.11 @ 2:29PM
Really Tennesee, you can do better than Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.). He's just another liberal, elite Republican who will block paring the federal government down to size. Can't you find someone to primary him?
Denver Todd| 11.10.11 @ 11:30PM
Just a heads up that John Pozsgai passed away on October 12, 2011. He was 79. May he rest in peace.
POST American| 11.11.11 @ 6:08AM
--------------------BOTTOM LINE-----------------------
"Understand, over 70% of ALL laws
passed in America now ---come directly
from the UN. That's right -----70%."
How can we waste time on chicken feed
DIS---tractions like the EPA when, in reality,
in 2011, they are in absolute lockstep with
the PRIVATE, corporate CON-solidation
and EUGENICS borg --otherwise known
as the U.N..
An UNDENIABLE sign of TOTAL CON--TROLL
that, as the agendas of the Globalists unfold,
NOT A PEEP from any of our 'CON-servative'
2012 candidates.
We don't even hear a thing from JOHN BOLTON
on this utterly criminal usurpation of American
sovereignty ---and sovereignty worldwide.
---------------HUAC/NUREMBERG 2012------------
Karen| 11.12.11 @ 4:20PM
One of the biggest problems with regulations is that they disallow all room for common sense.
POST American| 11.13.11 @ 11:18PM
--------------------FINAL WORD------------------------
Cut to the chase, get to the source of
a whole century of 'on the go' world poison--
the utra rich, TAX FREE, usury feuled,
EUGENICS driving, sovereignty and culture
destroying, 'benny violent' foundations
and NGOs ----among the most prominent
being the ROT-child Rockefeller created
'U.N.'.
wedding dresses | 11.14.11 @ 3:12AM
Maine overturning an old law that required registration at least 2 days before voting was kind of silly. It prevented people who turned 18 on that day from voting for example. I can understand why some would want to keep it, same day registration does lend itself to people coming in and registering from out of state to try and influence elections, but at the same time, if voter fraud is going to happen, 2 days isn't going to make a difference. Also, a pretty solidly blue state.
monte| 11.23.11 @ 4:25PM
THE EPA HAS A LONG HISTORY OF FAILURES USING BIASED PAYED FOR RESEARCH
YEARLY DEAD ZONE IN THE GULF OF MEXICO FROM MIDWEST FARMING TRAIL
CARBON DIOXIDE TO ETHANOL TO LOW LEVEL OZONE TRAIL
VOC’S TO OZONE TRAIL
SHORT TERM JOB CREATION BUT LONG TERM COST TO THE CONSUMER CALLED PASS THROUGH TAXES TRIAL
OSHA REQUIREMENTS INCLUDING HEAT AND CHEMICAL ON ALL ENERGY PRODUCTION FROM WIND AND SOLAR
REQUIRMENTS ON USE OF OXYGEN; TOO MUCH KILLS
THE TRAIL OF OXIDATION FROM OXYGEN TO LOW LEVEL OZONE