Uncle Sam’s Land Grab: Does the Clean Water Restoration Act Only Return What the Supreme Court Took? n title and in summary, the Clean Water Restoration Act sounds benign enough. But Dan Parmeter, executive director of the Minnesota-based American Property Coalition, calls it "the biggest federal power grab probably in the history of the country." Its summary by the Congressional Research Service notes that it "replace[s] the term ‘navigable waters' ... with the term ‘waters of the United States' ... ." The ostensible aim is to restore to the federal government authority under the Clean Water Act that the Supreme Court took away with narrow readings of the legislation in 2001 and 2006. Yet land-rights advocates believe the bill is much more insidious. "It's really a wolf in sheep's clothing," Parmeter said last month. "It's a national land-use-control bill. And if Mr. [James] Oberstar [the House sponsor] and other members of the committee want a national land-use-control bill, then explain it as a national land-use-control bill and let's have a debate ... . Don't try to mask it under the guise of the Clean Water Act." And Chuck Cushman, executive director and co-founder of the American Land Rights Association (based in Washington state), said: "It's really a watershed-control bill. It will control watersheds, and if you control watersheds, then you control the land."...The key phrase says that the Clean Water Restoration Act gives federal agencies control over waters of the United States and "activities affecting these waters." "That pretty much includes any kind of significant human activity," Parmeter said. "I think the Clean Water Restoration Act as-is goes way beyond - way beyond - what was ever intended by the Clean Water Act of 1972. It basically gets at controlling nonpoint source pollution."....