“What kind of a country will we leave for our children?”
-President Trump, in his first address to Congress.
The other day while stopped at an endless red light in Orlando, my five-year-old granddaughter in the back seat said, “Look, Grandpa. The clouds are moving.”
“Yes,” I said, frustrated. “But we’re not.”
“Yes we are!” she exclaimed. “Don’t you know the Earth is always turning, Grandpa?” “Absolutely,” I said, amazed. “Do you know what it’s called when the Earth makes one turn?”
“Earth-day,” she answered. “We learned that in school,” she added matter-of-factly.
I just got schooled by a kindergartener. She just pointed out that every day is Earth Day. So, why do we set aside only one day each year to celebrate Earth Day?
In 1969 at the height of the counterculture movement, Americans were slurping leaded gas in giant V8 vehicles. Big industries belched smoke into the air while Simon and Garfunkel sang “Bridge Over Troubled Waters.” Senator Gaylord Nelson of Wisconsin, after a massive oil spill in California, was inspired by the anti-war activism. He fused that energy with a growing public awareness of pollution to force environmental issues onto the national agenda. April 22 was selected because it fell between Spring Break and Final Exams. The first “national teach-in on the environment,” aka, Earth Day was April 22, 1970. Forty-seven Earth-years later, what have we accomplished? Here are a few examples.
President Lyndon Johnson established the National Environmental Policy Act in 1970. It’s often referred to as the “Environmental Magna Carta” for its impact. It became an international model and established the United States as a leader in the environmental movement. President Nixon signed an Executive Order establishing the EPA. DDT was banned by the EPA in 1972 after it was discovered to cause declining bird populations. In Florida, both osprey and brown pelicans came back from the brink of extinction. Bald eagles began to flourish. DDT in nursing mothers’ milk slowly disappeared. Most developed nations soon followed our lead.
Also in 1972, the Marine Mammal Protection Act resulted in several whale species beginning a slow recovery. The Endangered Species Act passed in 1973. The Clean Water Act of 1974 set standards for quality drinking water for all U.S. water systems. Also, in ’74 the EPA began the phase out of lead in gasoline, resulting in a 75% drop in lead levels in average Americans. The Toxic Substance Control Act was passed in 1976, resulting in the ban of cancer causing PCBs.
Under the leadership of the U.S., industrialized nations regulated chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) when it was linked to thinning the ozone layer. Today the holes in the poles’ ozone layers are healing.
A shift in U.S. leadership was evident when the Senate voted not to support the Kyoto Protocol of 1997. The Kyoto Protocol was an international effort to address global warming. However, in 2006, the documentary “An Inconvenient Truth” helped refocus public awareness on climate change. President Bush created the Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument in 2009. The monument expanded to 1.3 million square miles, three times the size of California by President Obama in 2012. The Department of the Interior in 2010 banned oil and gas drilling off the Atlantic Coast until 2017. The Paris Climate Change Conference in 2015, brought 175 world leaders including the U.S together. They agreed to a new coordinated plan to deal with climate change and rising sea levels.
What now? In his address to congress, President Trump promised to deregulate the gas and oil industries and revitalize the coal industry. On the campaign trail, he pledged to do away with the EPA. One of his first executive orders removed the restrictions on coal mines waste dumping into local rivers and streams. In his address to Congress which lasted over an hour, less than five seconds referenced environmental concerns. It looks like it is up to us to defend 47 years of environmental progress and to fight for its continued improvement.
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