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When State Department Legal Adviser John B. Bellinger III gave a controversial June 6 speech on the subject of "The United States and International Law," he mentioned that the Bush Administration had "put forward a priority list of over 35 treaty packages that we have urged the Senate to approve soon, including the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea." The latter is now up for Senate ratification, with a vote scheduled on Wednesday, and one of its many controversial provisions is the regulation of land-based sources of pollution. This treaty covers the water and the land. But now we have discovered that the Bush Administration has asked the Senate to ratify a treaty that defines one of those land-based sources of pollution as toilet flushing. No kidding.

It is amazing but true. The Bush Administration wants the Senate to ratify a treaty that will invite international inspections of what you flush down your toilet.

We are talking about Annex III of the "Protocol Concerning Pollution from Land-Based Sources and Activities to the Convention for the Protection and Development of the Marine Environment of the Wider Caribbean Region, with Annexes." You can read it for yourself here.

Annex III is titled, "Domestic Wastewater," which is defined as including "all discharges from households, commercial facilities, hotels, septage and any other entity..." These discharges are defined as encompassing (1) toilet flushing, (2) discharges from showers, wash basins, kitchens and laundries, or discharges from small industries, provided their composition and quantity are compatible with treatment in a domestic wastewater system.

Lawrence A. Kogan of the Institute for Trade, Standards, and Sustainable Development uncovered the dangerous details of this agreement and has termed it the "Toilet bowl treaty," noting that it constitutes a sort of mini-Law of the Sea Treaty. The protocol, he says, is one of 11 "regional seas" agreements. It is on an October 1 State Department list of "Treaties Pending in the Senate." (Not all of these treaties are currently being pushed by the Bush Administration).

Our major media were, as usual, asleep at the switch. It turns out that the White House issued a press release about submitting this treaty to the Senate for ratification. President Bush's statement was quite specific. He noted that "It is estimated that 70 to 90 percent of pollution entering the marine environment emanates from land-based sources and activities," and that parties to the treaty "are required to ensure that domestic wastewater discharges meet specific effluent limitations, and to develop plans for the prevention and reduction of agricultural nonpoint source pollution."

Bush claimed that "The United States would be able to implement its obligations under the Protocol under existing statutory and regulatory authority." In other words, he thinks this is supposed to affect others, not us. But this may not be the way some activist judges and international lawyers see it.

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