WATERED DOWN: A Supreme Court decision jeopardizes the country's streams and wetlands.

The Supreme Court narrowed the scope of the Clean Water Act of 1972, dramatically limiting the reach of this landmark federal law that was enacted to prevent and reverse pollution in the nation's waters, including the National Park System's 150,000 miles of rivers and streams. Intermittent streams, such as those in the arid Southwest or those that serve as headwaters to major rivers, including the 2,300-mile-long Missouri, as well as wetlands that are hydrologically linked below ground, are at risk of degradation. [Extracted from the article]