Great Lakes Hilarity (1998 Edition): Lake Champlain Promotion & Demotion from Great Lakes Status
For a brief moment in 1998, Lake Champlain became the nation’s sixth Great Lake. Specifically, Lake Champlain was a great lake from March 6-May 1, 1998.
Now this might be surprising, as Lake Champlain is a mere 10 percent the size of Lake Ontario.
But, thanks to Senator Leahy, who added an amendment defining the Great Lakes as including Lake Champlain to the the National Sea Grant College Program Reauthorization Act of 1997. And this bill, with Sen. Leahy’s amendment intact, became law on March 6, 1998.
Why this aquatic power grab? Sen. Leahy wanted Vermont schools to be able to get National Sea Grants too—and Vermont didn’t border any Great Lakes.
Naturally this caused Sen. Leahy some legislative heartburn, and he swiftly reversed course by stapling another amendment to the 1997 Reauthorization Act through the 1998 Supplemental Appropriations and Rescissions Act.
This became law on May 1, 1998.
But Sen. Leahy’s doomed attempt to promote Lake Champlain wasn’t for naught: in an compromise, the amendment allowed Lake Champlain States to get the grant-funding too.
All this form a tiny annotation in West Law’s entry on 33 U.S.C.A. § 1122.
