On December 2nd of 1970, President Richard Nixon established an organization to solve the growing problem surrounding the state of the environment. The Environmental Protection Agency, commonly known as the EPA, was created with the mission to establish and enforce environmental protection standards, conduct environmental research, provide assistance in eliminating pollution, and recommend new policies for environmental protection to the president. One of the influences that contributed to the development of the EPA was an article in Science magazine. Through his article The Tragedy of the Commons, Garrett Hardin conveyed the amount of damage that humans had caused to the environment. He made it clear that humans will exploit Earth’s natural …show more content…
The banning of the widespread use of DDT has allowed many bird populations to recover. DDT, which caused the eggs of birds to become weak, made it difficult for populations of birds like eagles and pelicans to grow. In 1972, the bald eagle was at risk of extinction; twenty five years later, in 2007, the bald eagle was removed off of the Endangered Species Act’s (ESA) “threatened” list. Along with this, the creation of the Clean Water Act (CWA) by the EPA has minimized water pollution and removed toxic substances from navigable waters. In 1972, about two thirds of America’s bodies of water were unsafe for fishing or swimming due to the dumping of untreated sewage into open water. The toxins from the sewage polluted both the lake and its inhabitants, along with posing a threat in regards to fires. For example, in 1969, the Cuyahoga River was polluted with oil and caught on fire. The passing of the CWA has been beneficial for aquatic life and the state of how safe water is. The standards of water have been created by the EPA as well; to ensure that water is safe for consumption, the Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA) was established. The EPA makes sure that states and water suppliers meet these standards, thus improving the health of Americans. The environment of America and the health of its people has improved since the creation of the EPA; however, …show more content…
This is because changes are more likely to be enforced more through associations that are government regulation. Since the government has the authority to create and pass acts and laws, there is a higher probability that change will occur. If private organizations or volunteers attempted to enforce positive environmental changes, it would not be as effective since they do not hold as much authority as the government. As of result, not as many people would follow the regulations set by the organizations. It would also take much longer for change to occur if the EPA did not oversee these additional environmental parameters. Since less people would follow the rules set by the organizations, it would take longer than if the government enforced and oversaw these additional regulations. Therefore, it would be more beneficial for the environment if the EPA oversaw additional environmental
During the late 1960s, the environmental movement focused mostly on public health and industrial themes. During this time of initial modern development, it received little attention from the champions of the social movements of the times such as civil rights and women’s equality. Most of the emphasis on environmental matters in these early years came from environmentally driven sociologists such as Paul Goodman, Murray Boochkin, and Herbert Marcuse. Many were exhilarated to become the heads of ecologically based institutions that would fight against government and corporation ecological mistreatments. Often times they would research and issue articles that pointed out abuses that directly affected the common household such as Boochkin’s “The Problems of Chemicals in Foods.” This type of research pointed out new types of environmental issues that either did not exist or did not matter before World War II and just now became identified. These types of papers had a message that reached everybody not just select individuals like many of the previous issues such as water management, and land
-The EPA is all about helping and protecting nature and our selves, they have passed many laws to keep us safe. Some of these laws include: C.A.A., or the Clean Air Act. This is a Federal law they passed to make sure we’re not releasing too much emission into the air, or releasing really bad things. Another law they have passed is the C.W.A., or Clean Water Act, this is also a Federal law, it protects our water systems from getting infested with pollution and toxic chemicals, without this we could lose our fishing
He announced it was the first symbolic act of “the environmental decade.” Between the years of 1970 and 1972, Nixon created the Environmental Protection Agency and signed laws including the Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, and the Marine Mammal Protection Act. Another thing he did was sign executive orders and international agreements on environmental issues. In early 1973, an international conference was held to discuss endangered species. The product of the conference was the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora. The U.S. needed a new legislation to meet some of the agreement’s provisions and it led to the Endangered Species Act. In Nixon’s State of the Union speech in 1973, he called for stronger wildlife protection. The results of these environmental laws and international agreements made the public extremely happy. Even though Nixon’s intentions were selfish when he got involved in environmental concerns, he responded unquestionably positive. All his hard work helped pave the way for a cleaner society.
The United States Environmental Protection Agency or EPA was initially proposed in 1970 by then President Richard Nixon. The agency was created to build on other environmental regulations enacted by the federal government and to consolidate those efforts to be managed by one government agency. It was also a reaction to the public’s growing concern over pollution and other environmental issues. Chemical waste was commonly released into bodies of water creating unsafe drinking water and rivers catching fire. Industrial air pollution, such as acid rain and smog, was also affecting manufacturing cities with coal-powered plants. There was little serious regulation on pollution until major environment laws started being passed by Congress in the early sixties.
The inception of U.S. Environmental policy most notably began under the Presidency of Richard Nixon; Nixon oversaw the passage of the Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act and the creation of the Environmental Policy Act (EPA). The Clean Water Act of 1972, in particular, enacted stringent laws to prevent pollutants from entering navigable waters, outlawing open sewers from dumping crud into a local stream and the law also protects land that filters and purifies water as it flows by. The Landmark law passed in 1972, however, has not impeded the pending water crisis facing the U.S. today. The United States must take immediate measures in order to combat the problem; given that the U.S. Office of the Director of National Intelligence now ranks water scarcity as a major threat to national security; right next to Terrorism (Sullivan). The United States should reform the Clean Water Act of 1972 to look for any deficiencies in the law.
Over the past decade a concern for protecting and preserving the environment has developed amongst United States citizens. Citizens have been promoting clean air, clean water, and clean land. Clean air means protecting the public from airborne contaminants known to be hazardous to human health. The Clean Air Act of 1970 is a law designed to control air pollution on a national level. It requires the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to develop and enforce regulations in order to protect the people (Environmental Protection Agency 2013). Clean water is water which is safe enough to be consumed by humans or used with low risk of harm. The Clean Water Act of 1972 was developed to restore and maintain the chemical, physical,
In the 1970’s there was growing confusion regarding environmental policy due to certain states creating environmental protection laws which were largely ineffective. To ease confusion, fix national guidelines, and monitor and enforce them President Richard Nixon created the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The EPA functions under three federal departments: the Interior, Agriculture, and Health, Education and Welfare departments. The original role of the EPA was to administrate the Clean Air Act which was enacted to reduce the air pollution caused by vehicles and industry. The EPA has since grown to enforce at least 12 major statutes such as: ocean dumping laws, safe drinking water, insecticides, and asbestos hazards in
However many non-profit groups are aiming to combat these Trump era EPA actions through the use of legislation. One such group is called, Earth Justice.
For years, the government has been regulating citizens and subsidizing companies that they like. Each time they restrict or support a company, they hurt the free market, which then hurts the economy and like a Rube Goldberg machine the entire country is affected. The most common and harmful regulations are those set by the environmental protection agency (EPA). The EPA tries to stop natural selection and save animals through human intervention. Nearly all of the regulations have an effect on how everyone goes about their day. For example, in California the EPA saved a small fish with a minuscule population by pumping 71 billion gallons of fresh water into the ocean, this started one of the biggest droughts in California ever. The EPA
Due to its scientific evidence and less bias author, I believe the article ‘EPA Pamphlet’ to be the more truthful and accurate of the two. The author states many pieces of scientific evidence to support his view on the state of pollution in Lake Erie. The authors of the article ‘So Long, Lake Erie’ have no scientific background and cannot use as many solid facts about the pollution, where it comes from, and how dangerous it is. Also, none of them work for the government, so probably have less of an idea about all the things that are being done to help save Lake Erie. The author of the EPA Pamphlet does in fact work for the government, and chose to focus on not only how the pollution to the lake is extremely harmful, but also how the public
President Richard Nixon officially created the Environmental Protection Agency, otherwise noted as the EPA, in the spring of 1970. However, concern for the environment and its protection began long before the government regulatory body. In years prior, environmentalism had planted its roots as a growing focus of many American citizens. Before the focus on the environment as we know it, there were multiple individuals who stressed the importance of nature and brought attention to the degradation of the environment through industrialization. Famous literary scholars first expressed their concern during the 1850’s—a direct response to the Industrial Revolution. Henry David Thoreau, with his ode to nature through Walden, or Life in the Woods, captured the importance of nature in a transcendental sense; while later in the nineteenth century, John Burroughs took a more realistic approach with his 27 volumes of essays on his experience with nature. In 1935, President Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal brought the sense of ecology into government acts; among which were The Soil Conservation Service—reducing the effects of erosion on agricultural land, and the Pittman-Robertson Act, responsible for funding state fishing and wildlife programs from taxes on hunting and fishing equipment.1
While talking about the Environment we need to touch briefly on FEMA before we move on. Considering all the natural disasters that have hit our country over the past few years (and escalating) I'm sure most of you are at least familiar with this agency. If not, FEMA stands for Federal Emergency Management Agency, your to-go in case of emergency in our country, forest fire, earthquake, tornado, hurricane, mudslide, volcanic eruption, they cover it all. If some act of nature has knocked over your community, they step in and help dig you out and, in theory, give you funds to help rebuild and get your life back in order.
Scattered with flowing rivers, lush forests, and everlasting plains, the environment is extraordinary, but is it a place for the government? Since December 2, 1970, the EPA has been restricting the use of our planet and taking our rights away.
In fact, environmentalists came into the picture to push the government into doing something concrete in order to preserve the earth’s ecosystems. The government had the moral obligation to take action, and some laws were enacted to control pollution. For example, the Clean Air Act was in 1963, the Clean Water Act in 1972, and the Safe Drinking Water Act in 1974. Additionally, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency or EPA was established in 1970, with the purpose of protecting the health of human beings and the environment by enforcing regulations based on laws passed by the
In the academia and policy talks, the ecological crisis has turned into a well-established topic (Yearley, 1992). The rise of environmental politics in the 1960s was mainly driven by environmental movements and a resurgent global civil society. Jamison (1996), notedthat the movement focussed on creating awareness throughout the 1960s. For instance, the publication of Silent Spring by Rachel Carlson (1962), Paul Ehrlich’s The Population Bomb (1968) and Garrett Hardin’s Tragedy of the Commons (1968) focused public attention to the issue, and made the idea of ecological limits popular. This period also saw the creation of environmentalNon-government Organizations ( NGOs) focusing on the protection of the environment such the Worldwide Fund for Nature (WWF) and the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN). In the 1970s, the environmental movement became a political concern and entered the phase of organisation and institutionalisation (Jamison, 1996). For example, one of the 130 outcomes is the implementation of the United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP) after the Stockholm conference, and the establishment of the transnational environmental group Greenpeace. There was also a growth of alternative holistic visions of the nature-society relationship, likeGoldsmith’s Blueprint for survival (1972). This was underpinned by the rising recognition of the Limits to Growth (Meadows et al., 1972). The environmental movement