Earth Day Revisited

When Senator Gaylord Nelson of Wisconsin issued the call for the first Earth Day in 1970, he may not have realized that he was marking the arrival of a movement.

Environmental concerns emerged in the political cauldron of the 1960s, but it took a call to action to focus these energies and bring about real change.

The goal of the first Earth Day was to focus attention on the damage done by centuries of neglect and industrial invention. Advocates hoped to gain and mobilize the sympathies of a nation largely ignorant of the harms done to their world.

Denis Hayes, head of a group of eco-minded college students called Environmental Action, coordinated the swiftly expanding list of planned Earth Day events.

When April 22 finally arrived, more than 20 million people participated in events that ranged from "teach-ins" to "dump-ins" to demonstrations to seminars.

Congress adjourned for the day and many of its members attended educational events. In New York City, Fifth Avenue was closed to traffic to allow more than 100,000 people to stroll to an ecology fair in Central Park.

On college campuses nationwide, students staged symbolic protests.

A wave of legislation followed the first Earth Day, including the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency (1970), the Clean Air Act (1970), the Clean Water Act (1972) and the Endangered Species Act (1973). Support seemed to cut across party and class lines.

In years afterward, the Earth Day phenomenon went global. The Earth Day Network reports that the 20th anniversary saw more than 200 million people from 140 countries participate in demonstrations, rallies, marches and cleanups. In the United States, 3,600 communities organized environmental events. This earned Earth Day the distintion of being the largest organized demonstration in history.

The popularity of the green movement has waxed and waned since it burst onto the political scene in the early 1970s.

The oil crisis of the '70s, the anti-regulation sentiment of the '80s, and the corporate-interest backlash of the '90s have all served to temper, and in some cases, reverse the gains of the movement.

But in the year 2000, proponents of environmental protection can look back on a series of improvements in the United States.

Air: The decades since the first Earth Day have seen consistent improvement in air quality. The Clean Air Act (1970) and several subsequent acts established stricter emissions controls and air quality standards.

The Environmental Protection Agency identifies six pollutants as "criteria" pollutants: carbon monoxide, lead, nitrogen dioxide, ground level ozone, particulate matter and sulfur dioxide.

Emissions of all other criteria pollutants except nitrogen oxides have decreased as well. Nitrogen oxides are involved in the formation of ozone. That, in turn, contributes to the production of smog, a festering urban problem.

Water: By the late 1960s, roughly 64 percent of America's lakes and rivers were unsuitable for fishing or swimming much less drinking.

Environmental horror stories from the era persist. The Nashua River, which runs through New Hampshire and Massachusetts, would change colors depending on the dye in use by the paper mills that lined its shore. The oil-slick surface of Ohio's Cuyahoga River caught fire in 1969, sending an alarm call to even the most ecologically disinterested.

In 1972 Congress passed te Clean Water Act which restricted sewage and chemical dumping. The effect was dramatic. The Water Environment Federation reports that more than 60 percent of the nation's waters are now fit for swimming and fishing. Even major urban rivers have been reclaimed. Among them is the Cuyahoga.

Land: Getting rid of garbage safely has been a consistent focus of the green movement.

By 1970, the practice of burying waste in landfills was proven to be a dangerous source of contaminated runoff. Existing landfills had reached maximum capacity, and there was little land left for new sites.

Many cities and states resorted to transporting waste to distant locations, although even this led to embarrassment. In 1987, a garbage barge left Islip, N.Y., to deposit its waste elsewhere. It found no willing takers and returned home 164 days later, with its smelly load still aboard.

As a result, the nation has turned, however slowly, to recycling. In many areas, recycling programs are not only encouraged but mandated. By 1990, the recycling industry began generating considerable profit.

The careless disposal of toxic waste products was finally addressed in 1980 by the Superfund Act. This provided for the identification and cleanup of sites deemed a danger to public health.

By the end of the 1997 fiscal year, 498 of 1,405 sites on the National Priorities List had been refurbished and 844 were in some stage of "remediation."

The government has increased the acreage of protected lands, including forests and wetlands threatened by development and commercial waste.

Wildlife: By the late '60s the steady conversion of lands for residential and commercial use was done with little thought of the animal poplations being displaced and even destroyed.

With ecological awareness came the realization that not only are these animals valuable in their own right, but they serve as indicators of the health of the land they inhabit.
The Endangered Species Act in 1973 established a list of protected animals close to extinction. The campaign for species preservation found its first cause in the bald eagle. Its symbolic value made it a compelling poster boy. By 1994, it had been taken off the list.

The past 20 years have also seen the re-introduction of the California condor and the gray wolf into their native habitats.

While the list of endangered animals continues to grow, the ESA has also proven an effective legal tool in protection of forest and wetlands from logging and farming.

Written by Steven Shaklan