Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
issues were not a standard feature on the television nightly news, which
instead showed compelling images of outrageous violation of citizens' civil
rights. Congress recognized that environmental awareness was not as broad
or deep as the concern and disgust for civil rights violations and there was
no political support for a universal command and control environmental law
parallel to those created by the Civil and Voting Rights Acts.
In addition, the constitutionality of an environmental law limiting or con-
trolling actions by private entities was an unresolved question. The Civil
Rights legislation was supported by the constitutional guarantees of equal
protection of the laws for all citizens under the 14th Amendment and protec-
tion of voting rights under the 15th Amendment. Because of these constitu-
tional amendments, the Acts were applied to private as well as government
actions without the threat of a constitutional challenge. There were no such
constitutional amendments addressing the environment and for reasons
outlined below, there was no real possibility of enacting an environmental
amendment to the constitution.
As discussed above, there was no broad support for stringent environ-
mental control, and the projected time table for passage of an amendment
was viewed as unacceptable by those working on developing a solution to
the immediate national environmental problems. The environmental neglect
was growing at an accelerated pace and passage of an amendment would
take many years after its proposal and then could be rejected. Just a few years
later, the Equal Rights Amendment was passed by Congress in 1972 but after
the allotted 10 years it was not ratified by a sufficient number of states and
it was not adopted. Also Congress, as well as environmental advocates, saw
the proposal of a constitutional amendment as a diversion of energy and
resources away from formulating and adopting immediately implementable
environmental policies and regulations. Thus, the passage of a new amend-
ment was highly unlikely and Congress rejected the option.
Rejection of command and control legislation and pursuit of a constitu-
tional amendment left the Congress with limited and constrained options
for environmental protection. An option was needed that was not challenge-
able for constitutionality and could be quickly enacted. Up to the point of
proposing legislation in the late 1960s, the environmental push had been led
by academics and well-informed and environmentally committed members
of Congress and their staff. This group had successfully avoided creating an
active and strong opposition movement and in order to gain support and
ultimate passage of legislation, the selected approach had to maintain this
trend. Stimulation of a strong antienvironmental movement, likely led by
those concerned that private commerce and property rights would be com-
promised, was seen as a significant constraint to be avoided if meaningful
legislation was to be passed in a timely manner.
The results of these considerations and constraints were compromises
that created both the concept and content of the National Environmental
Policy Act (NEPA). The compromise included creation of a “warm feeling”
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