Over Ruled: The Human Toll of Too Much Law

In the 1980s, the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) designated an enormous area around Butte—about 300 square miles—as a Superfund site. The agency began working with the current corporate owner, Atlantic Richfield Company, on a cleanup plan. 30 It was a daunting task. About 20,000 acres of soil were “severely impacted by airborne emissions and millions of gallons of ground water were polluted,” posing “well documented risks to human health and the environment.” 31 Nearly forty years of cleanup work followed. Finally, in 2016, Atlantic Richfield announced that it had just about finished work on private landowners’ properties. The company estimated that it had spent about $450 million. 32

Prints & Photographs Division, Farm Security Administration/Office of War Information Collection, https://www.loc.gov/item/2017777816/