It has come to my attention that I misquoted Chief Justice Roberts in the middle of the second paragraph of this paper. In the oral arguments of the Rapanos v. US Supreme Court case of 2006, the court was forced to discuss the definition of a tributary because Paul D. Clement (Solicitor General, Department of Justice) was attempting to make the point that a particular ditch located adjacent to a wetland was a tributary to the waters of the United States.

Chief Justice Roberts at one point asks, “Am I right that a tributary is not a defined term in the regulations?” And latter states, “You -- you put a lot of weight on the tributary question in your approach by giving up the hydrological connection. Your response is you don't need a hydrological connection because it's right next to a tributary. But for those of us who are having a little trouble with the concept of tributary, you don't leave us much to fall back on.”

Therefore, I feel while my original quote was incorrect, it’s overall message is faithful to the meaning intended by Chief Justice Roberts. The original misquote was found in Doyle and Bernhardt (2011), which is reference #2 in my paper.