Were Carter and Nixon Environmentalists?
12/23/99
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RELAYED TEXT STARTS HERE:
Title: Carter, Nixon: Environmentalists?
Source: The Associated Press
Status: Copyright 1999, contact source for permission to reprint
Date: December 23, 1999
Byline: JOHN HUGHES
WASHINGTON (AP) - Though they may not rank with conservationists like
Theodore Roosevelt and author Rachel Carson, Richard Nixon and Jimmy
Carter deserve credit for some of the greatest environmental
protections of the 20th Century, two environmental groups said
Thursday.
Carter's successful fight to pass a 1980 law that protects 104
million acres in Alaska - more than a fourth of the state - was one
of the most significant environmental actions of the last 100 years,
according to the Sierra Club and The Wilderness Society.
Just two other actions were on both groups' lists of the 12 greatest
environmental accomplishments - passage of the National Environmental
Policy and Endangered Species acts, both during the Nixon
administration.
The Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act added tens of
millions of acres to national parks, wildlife refuges and wilderness
areas, and passed with Carter's help.
``He was actually a very good environmental president,'' said Carl
Pope, executive director of the Sierra Club. ``Alaska really is the
last state in the nation where you have all the original ecosystems
intact and functioning.''
One of the laws passed during the Nixon administration, the 1970
National Environmental Policy Act, requires federal agencies to weigh
the environmental consequences of their actions, to consider
alternatives and involve the public in the process.
A U.S. Court of Appeals decision based on the act in the early 1980s
led to protections of nearly 7 million acres of forest wilderness.
Michael Francis, director of national forests for The Wilderness
Society, called the act ``the premiere document in American law that
sets this country aside from other countries. The public has to be
listened to - it just can't be blown off.''
The 1973 Endangered Species Act protected nearly 1,200 plants and
animals in danger of extinction and is credited with putting millions
of acres of land off limits to development.
Other key actions, according to The Wilderness Society, include
Roosevelt's creation of the first wildlife refuge in 1903, the
beginning of the National Park Service in 1916 and the start of
annual Earth Day celebrations in 1970.
Nixon had a role in five of the 12 actions on Sierra's list,
including creating the Environmental Protection Agency and signing
the Clean Water Act.
Sierra, however, does not include Carter or Nixon among 12
``environmental champions.'' That list includes Roosevelt; Sierra
Club founder John Muir; Carson, the author of Silent Spring, which
warned the nation of the dangers of pesticides; and deep sea explorer
Jacques - Cousteau.
Both groups say they would have rated President Clinton's attempt to
protect 50 million acres of federal forests as one of their top 12
accomplishments. But the forest plan will not be completed until late
next year at the earliest.