William Reilly thought he had a deal. The besieged chief of the Environmental Protection Agency was certain Dan Quayle had agreed that any piece of land that was flooded or saturated with water for 15 consecutive days a year would constitute a "wetland" and deserved protection from private development. The next day Reilly received a call from Allan Hubbard, who heads Quayle's Council on Competitiveness, telling him the deal was off. Within days the council hatched a new plan, narrowing the definition of "wetness" by six extra days, satisfying a powerful coalition of farmers and builders and reducing America's wetlands by...
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