BackStory; 1980s Environmentalism and How the Reagan-Era Shaped the Natural World

major funding for backstory provided by an anonymous donor the national down for the canaries and josephine robert cornell the moral foundation virginia welcome to best of show that looks at the history behind the headlines animators do need to the podcast each week along with her colleagues nathan connelly joins freeman we're exploring different aspects and just about this show was recorded remotely as grim realities of baking contest are uncovered it because of that the audio quality isn't always the best but we have and there was the civil rights act in show thirty years ago in april nineteen seventy millions of people in nine states department an activism that quickly spread around the world were perhaps more probably around the earth earth day demonstrations began in

practically every city and town in the united states this morning the first massive nationwide protest against the pollution of the environment the outcry drove the newly formed some students went to school wearing gas masks the automobile was abandoned parts of some cities including new york miami plant a dead island parade skywriting planes world about to inscribe the word error over los angeles in jamestown new york relatively modest beginnings is this case this was the national organizer of the first earth day in nineteen seventy and back then organizing a big event like this looks a lot different there was no internet or social media to get the word out we didn't have the ability to i reach out through facebook and twitter you know email or even have

computers for hiv so davis and his team turned to other ways to generate some of them we do have a lot of what you could call broadcast coverage to figure out some way to get the newest westfall press conference or all of the us but he says the biggest and rescues thing they did was shell out about half the money for a full page yet in the new york times to cross says twenty seconds birthday and then in bold letters of disease has affected our country that was ross maggio somebody dumped garbage and the huntsman spraying ddt on our food electricity isn't decay it's scarier as man and then bam bam bam bam route through the us citizens there's a creek this this is not for my exercising is picking up there's going to be all those kinds of things is woefully under supporters that this is an effort

to change direction it was or you have something and sincerity cities was uncertain essentially every city every town every village every crossroads of america he estimates from the wire services and being an excess of twenty million people would make it probably the largest organized event mr pj and what do you think the firm into all of these civil rights struggle of women struggle and war in vietnam but people were receptive to this new costs less democratic that they could see about equality won isn't this wasn't a new cause it was a new if you will actually allow us mr

rockwell so the previous your cities across the country there were poor people rising up to try to stop freeways from inner city neighborhoods rising concern about ancient legend gasoline problems with clear cutting a distant thing after the revolution people in them mr gary indiana in los angeles and air there was a lot like the air and chains on new delhi today the senate all of the sounds rub their lives of people cared about each of the change was that they had not prior to irritate much thought that they had anything in common birds for memorable interchange with prominent conservation leaders say yes we serve blustery what the hell is clean air act into of birds it would have been absurd question would elicit that show all eight years after earth day we were well although separate threads together into this november of modern environmentalism

in the wake of birth a success this is the plan to turn the protest into policy in the nineteen seventy midterm election push to light worn by ruling family members of congress and once again there were paid off a few months after earth day congress passed the clean air act which was only one of many new laws on the horizon and the momentum that came out of the election followed by the queen era just created the context within which relatively rapidly and we pass the clean water act the endangered species act the marine mammal protection act to social system for safe drinking water act and that summer environmental president richard nixon was there with an executive order set up the epa appointed barrasso yesterday they didn't intervene or applesauce band

immediately banned lead paint lead in gasoline so it was a remarkable period where the pro environment panel in american politics was all about as far as we could culture for about a decade now to the jimmy carter administration with this remarkable unity and the nixon administration the epa answer for and you had the good fortune to be involved and harvard illustration embracing solar energy as you're beginning of an understanding is that he didn't come to the conclusion that you know the current minister zhou was a time of enormous hopeful i was the head of the thermal solar energy research institute which is now called the national renewable energy laboratory and at the time i was there we were spending more money employ more ph he's getting more renewable energy field in pretty much the rest of the world put together they're actually getting twenty percent of the nation's energy from rentals by the year two thousand

and the incident that i had and was charged with coming up with the program to achieve that and so we listen to a bunch of university scientist says whether actual us worked for two years ago how he would accomplish that goal in bahrain making america vastly more efficient so it's twenty percent of the smaller number and then meeting that was renewals so those overall feeling of enormous hope but the election of ronald reagan dinner says that help came to a screeching halt for energy research institute about one third of my staff one hundred percent of our contractors that was more than a thousand people or were minimal energy output of the university's a couple of whom went on to win nobel prizes

later there's been terminated me and reduced our budget which was a thirty million dollars this is what i had to address all the real energy persuading give up tenure professorships another great chance to comment on this project for a sustainable future and suddenly they were given two weeks' notice and a severance pay i said it was a natural my life by writing letters recommendations for one hopi police cars jenkins despite the setbacks this has continued to advocate for mubarak

and this week he celebrated the fiftieth anniversary of earth day alongside and billions around the globe because it covered it goes to the cell that he was in berkeley is that dennis is that some of our lessons can be learned from the public's response to our current pandemic you just know it's all those things by any one nation that wanted to act and maybe we could learn something from the way that we're addressing some of these human health issues and applying them more broadly to use in some ways very much larger environmental threats and there will be in the long run unless we get awfully aggressive awfully fast ways that seemed improbable the deaths that will come as a consequence of climate change will make the relative harms being done by private banking seem extremely small by comparison is of course something that takes place over a longer period of time but the fundamental ethical global cooperation in winfield we should be able to do it in the books

today on the show in light of the fiftieth anniversary of the environment is more specifically different policies of shape efforts have protected him and just as the displacement of big change was that happened between the end of the nineteen seventies into the nineteen eighties it's a show that alter the course of environmental rules of american politics for decades after so on today's program we're going to focus exclusively on how that change played out during the nineteen eighties you'll hear about the earth and environmental justice in the world issues first

seventies and it is so i don't touch midget term he teaches environmental studies at wellesley and is the co author of the republican reversal conservatives and the environment from dixon to trial in the book james co author andrew eisenberg no to the nineteen seventies was seen as the environment it so yeah so she was in the nineteen eighties yeah and how quickly things can sometimes change when you go back and re nineteen seventy two when your lead the republican party's they're emphasizing their commitment to the environment you positioning themselves as leaders and the head of the democrats on the issue and really shining congress were not a democratic congress on the campaign trail

urgency of environmental issues describes the regulations nixon administration is prime examples of overregulation calling or the economy is if those two things are not entirely water he's coined the phrase inside of your book the republican river and so sure you argue that ronald reagan was the beginning of this reversal can you expand on what you mean why that republican reversal a big piece of it is aligning people that there was this moderate republican tradition that wasn't just about nixon it was also about what some folks who are in the us senate the people like john chafee from rhode island who were court orders laws like the clean air act and the clean water act and so did at west point a dividing line

she says use seventies so are economic issues moore's law energy use changes in our oil industry starting in nineteen seventy three and later in the nineteen seventies the rolling stones people's confidence in the economy but also the abundance of resources and energy and suddenly

<unk> were very much focus on protecting our economic growth limiting access to energy one of our big ryan emphasized this again anytime we use energy resources and restart its economy it seems like another factor and you tell me if i'm wrong was changing attitudes about expertise in science particularly within the republican party was there a shift in the way science is yes i think you're right there is absolutely our repositioning of the republican party with respect science and it's a repositioning of games or elements of it in the nixon administration but also a lot of respect for concern about twenty scientists are writing about issues of air pollution water pollution woessner

and so our social we're sad one does the cold war it is of american exceptionalism there's any that

come into this republican reversal you know one of the things and raining emphasized time and time again was exceptional country was and how that exception wasn't really changed our notion of abundance of natural resources and all of the american people and the american economy really put an opposition to environmental laws and environmental regulations why we chose reagan universal search also know you're a stronger as the eurozone all seems so silly so give us some specific examples of the early reagan administration's efforts at the roll back in testing regulations out

or open up on opportunities for unregulated mining are on odd feeling for oil thousands are also sort of the reagan administration well one area one priority for the administration was expanding access to or i'll call on old lance and so secretary of the interior james her murderer why were to be pieces well there was also in the administration pushed for ones which way make it easier fossil fuel resources so the largest source of cool and the united states has been on a river basin in

montana and wyoming and that was one of the reagan administration that where you rolled a low flow of the school meals also we were seniors around you early nineteen eighties when there was a lot of concern about the requirements for reducing emissions so he couldn't land and not administration bushwhacking slowdown regulatory process imposed limitations and to require remembers one she plants another major industry or malign some regulations that would require emissions well we started getting calls

you know today suggests it's still very strong support in general store water they are making a deal says lauren regan and associates on all seats were are we it will stop all right the reagan administration's initiatives one arkansas or marks song about the administration's direction for sure on these bats start of the administration actually have a whole lot of success over three four years and making the kinds of changes that the administration for a man

area like literally appointees the white house or mismanagement and corruption of the people he brought down well halfway through his administration were marching in fact one of them was also the epa at the start of the agency under the nixon administration and so it was all the reagan administration are intelligent the moderator annette never acted on that big issue as ray george h w bush's he mr menzel your all yours you'll hear more about where a show

that we wanted to crawl scientist last year to grassroots youth into an suv editor ground war ii but the summer of nineteen seventy eight a trucking company drove across north carolina secretly dumping toxic liquid a long stretches of railroads the contaminants initially came from a transformer repair company who hardly so called midnight jumpers to get rid of the liquid in the end the truck drivers illegally contaminated two hundred and forty miles across the state faces huge thirty one thousand gallons of oil filled with the cashless kettle called polly chlorinated baton rounds or pc be but congress were veterans who are in jail but north carolina state government in trouble wouldn't do with all that soul also cheesy beads

there was a getaway detoxify says they decided to dump the contaminated soil and went so but we are so they put sixty thousand tons of one option was a sight now that had already been approved by the epa as a lasso are hazardous waste but the state's a movie that so i would be too costly so instead ignore the landfill in their own backyard we'll do they know this decision in environmental there was a strong al gore right ought to bear and everyday people came together to protest a sighting of a land feel they felt it was in justice not by the very government that was voted protectors to a scoreless situation reverend william kearney is associate pastor sure in a good organic and not too far away schoenbaum where malaysia was

cited today he researches health and wellness in rural communities he also gives tours in warren county about its environmental activism and the protest of the pc the landfill most have also protested what happened anyone else's community to say really wanted to send a message globally that there were all of the wars when it comes to a social environment justice issues so what did the state government choose whatever i believe because warren county was considered cory new law now art's percentage ask american population so if people thought that because it was mostly black community considered politically important that that we were exploited as soon as the

state government designated mourner counting society landfill residents and organizations like the end only seek he began to settle so the level of the water already shaky local car to stay in touch and in nineteen eighty two because of green light from the epa to start at best when protesters took to the streets so the state highway patrol began living in all the marchers as they approached the entrance to the state and the signs and chants of the protesters made clear the opposition to have a toxic chemical period in their account in september nineteen eighty two that the first circle arrived in a land fee you know that they were about four to fire

on protesters were arrested on the day and protesters were shot and was a movement of the charts on what why american or a wary and last summer jerry patterson science and on bills were arrested were you and you also uses and then the protest didn't stop the site euro and feel but at least it help minimize the site of the size of it do you think that it makes that land so any safer to the extent that any way so for the seabees to be safe the state had said that this was a slave slide they got waivers epa to quietly or even though there was concerns about the water table and try thirty feet or so beneath the earth that way and feel that that was not up to world epa standards so out there was always questions about the safety of the site and as a matter fact within a pure time actually began to air bob lutz andy actually water

so that super g view war and the sign says always concern about the safety of the site and believe that even though it was was a fortune in warren county because maybe people thought warren county would really push back butler county didn't push and it wasn't just local residents who lined streets blocking the truckloads of pc be contaminated soil civil rights leaders from across the country see environmental reasons ending that civil rights social injustice and environmental of all this was new cause it came to be known as the environmental justice movement that sought to address environmental inequities in mostly low income areas in communities of color we're getting to be and that we as blacks are always

resisted racial injustice but it brought racial injustice and environmental justice and the same movement and so a highlight the fact that many of our communities black communities would be a target with landfills in other unhealthy of diseases and historically black people were so focused on our social justice and have time and the former justice so to carry on corey protesters didn't stop the landfill from the baltimore county but their actions did cement and environmental history ironically back sometimes goes unrecognized red hair in warren county mimi owns the everyday people who took part in a bigger protests don't realize the impact of what we

get warren county so they still see ourselves in ten and without a voice and so i hope that i help the highlight of what happened one county how the movement has made impact around the globe and how that people celebrate the fact that we're gonna birth to do that but we haven't seen that here as a layoff i want county's history has been documenting stories of protest nearly forty years here's terry colson jones first there were two thousands while she participated in protests when she was just a teenager i was never afraid even when we lie out in front of the trucks and they were just that we would know you were embroiled and you know they told us don't say anything don't talk don't be disobedient just live there they were coming up and carry us to the us and it's a

yale one thing though in our daughter they told us that we would not have a criminal record but we really haven't you know anything on a background but five years later i went outside in criminal background checks that came out and county call me for a job and they said but there's one thing something a background they don't know what it is an authentic and mike beebe ish and that's what it was impeding traffic if the charts so i know you know you have to tell him that i was engaged in the process i guess i never imagined it would be what it is today i never ever thought about environmental justice movement we are

what we thought was the right thing to do again residents continue to raise the alarm about the souls rest meanwhile counter protest inspired activist other environmental injustices in nineteen eighty seven you know a church of christ is andres it is outdated work out his claim of racism and shown a strong correlation toxic waste facilities your communities of color easy you guys

process was in the end it took twenty years for the senate to be the toss and in twenty or three years where there was a celebration last night to celebrate the declassification of the site so there was a remediation but this deal comes sirens from our residents about what happened when a period that this toxic chemical about water away i'm going to oregon and it's a war there has been a real to try it for the health impacts of our moon packs so i hope that going forward a lot to lose if we can revisit it began to assess the health or community are people doing that period even now what's the story is that during a whole lot of

distrust but i like to say that we are we're the people and the government represents the people and that's what they wore county story so powerful disparity people stood up against gov look how that be even though the site was still plays a workout it was reduced in size and i'm layering need with questions so hard and i save two all those who see issues a secret sirens what are you doing what you doing what you do and that in warren county we see there is everyday people if we were outside of warsaw and ej you we can make a difference from my perspective what drives me is our community to move from this is that the mindset of a song what we can do right now was moved to from now how we use our our legacy our

history our movement to ourselves how people read about us talk about us now we are stored cartier is your shot he's us attorney national resources you are actually you are call my office and ask how

many messages yeah so and so's try to reassure jittery i call this person and that person says you you're not going to believe what i just heard i was just in a cabinet meeting you know with the wind with my leadership and dull hotel is saying we shouldn't have an ozone treaty we should tell people to protect themselves are not a personal rejection first says so and ask strangers i call reporters for the washington post the wall street journal and i told him the story in this as well we can go where you're say sell it out of desperation because i knew i couldn't get my source away at a ferocious will call the interior department and ask the secretary unesco falcon and half an

hour later the reporters called i can say so what is your car and it could cost benefit analysis i said in history says it'll cost a billion dollars over ten years weld if you have to buy everybody a hat and two bottles of sunscreen and her sunglasses every year and a diplomatic another ten billion dollars a status report too artsy fcc horowitz or commonly found in everyday aerosols like hairspray as well as refrigerants the seventies to say just as the fcc for release of his first year har har har har

so you end up with a weak or ozone shields i wore hats letting in more dangerous ultraviolet radiation that would cause skin cancer that's to class and many other bear the first reaction of the industry rose and early eighties bassist we see calories the state tv news it made all the papers cause it was one of the first times that we came to the realization that the chemicals we use the things were doing could really alter the global atmosphere there is a very strong consumer action right away it'll say you know i

don't need a prayer on deodorant that god in this for anyway and consumer shift very quickly to lines and pump sprays some companies reacted to consumer trends really sharp in the sales of cst is for us all now keep in mind this is the nineteen seventies the environmental decade and as you heard in our first segment ronald reagan approach environmental protection whoa whoa whoa so i asked him how the reagan administration the eighties tackle the issue of csa news one thing that carter administration was as you're finding that the cdc is still going on after the aerosol market <unk> use for

refrigeration we use for solids holmes the leakage from that's set of uses was also a threat to the wells are aware that that finding schrader requiring duke restrictions last one regulator who's now makes its projection for the presidents reagan is our projected winner ronald wilson reagan a california sports announcer an actor in the first three years the epa was run by aaron course such gore for the other big name from the interior department was james why you might remember jake turner talking about prefer earlier in the show she was forced to resign in nineteen eighty three after a scandal over mismanagement reagan brought back william ruckelshaus who ran epa under nixon

now how my organization nrdc do that after the carter administration and made his finding of endangerment we could sue the agency to force action to be taken as the way the clean air act works at good citizens groups the authority to go to court to force the agency do things that are required what we don't want to take that lawsuit and the first two years because we were afraid that now the first read and epa administrator and courses which is revoke the finding of danger so we waited then when bill ruckelshaus came in we knew him to be a man a lawyer and principal and science trillin and we knew that he wouldn't react to a lawsuit by revoking the scientific finding so that's what we brought a lawsuit but just how davis says public interest in the issue was way into juarez so its eighteen

years he's a los angeles zero wrong answer cyrus in history it was john hodgman really was more than most influential able immediately and us so we agreed to a settlement agreement to give the agency two years to work on the sun is in these

outreach and engagement and i remember a meeting in vienna virginia were representatives of the dupont company which was the biggest maker of she'll choose caitlin kenny and they said we want to show you are going all christmas and honesty to their on alternatives and one by one they said we have this one and that one and these were the work will get more expensive than the city's so there's no answer and a lightbulb went off in my head and i said to them i mean if the supply of the csc has was restricted so that their price went up these other chemicals would be competitive and they all looked a little dumbfounded i'm still not quite sure last answer

in nineteen eighty six at one of these conferences as they made me the one two keynote speakers from industry ministry spoke first reset rehab i we need to limit how much more of these chemicals we may and i gave a presentation which is that we need to face these chemicals out and if we were really just following the science we do it right away and i realized that there's a need for a transition so i propose that we phased out completely over a ten year period by that time well there was a new epa administrator min lee thomas who was in the rocket's how small streams of desert or straight shooter he decided that a ninety five percent phase out over ten years should be the us policy going into a new set of international negotiations and it wasn't about the time of the

ozone or scholar was a whole is the name for huge drop in the levels of ozone in the stratosphere over antarctica that shows up at the end of the long winter directions levels plummet houses discover well there was a research station in antarctica with a device that worked up and measure the ozone concentration on the ground for a couple of years they found these anonymous low readings in september when the sun came up and didn't know what to make of as a religion that sheer nature happen again and finally they publish their results in a

major magazine and then it turned out that folks at nasa have a satellite that's been circulating over the whole world including antarctica ten years of world records of oslo where concentrations and they went back into the files and sure enough they found evidence that this ozone hole had opened in the late nineteen seventies and grow grow grow as tony with the other penguins we have very many states are in suzanne well what happens if the south pole consumer world away from the hustle and bustle washington dc that is the ozone hole

require a global solution newish us never to get negotiations going on one country's mostly was between the industrial countries because of the rolling countryside don't make these chemicals there was between us europeans scandinavians and the japanese were only other major manufactures silly us japan europe where the manufacturers and the other developed countries are more concerned about this so there was a struggle that you see this is the nineteen eighty five discovery of the ozone hole in negotiators a boost and help set the stage for what many people see as one of the biggest environmental success stories of the twentieth century are you

he's a gifted person is our ten years my initial reaction you know it's great it's an agreement but my initial reaction was this isn't going to do the job and i set to visit a few weeks later to the same guy and so i'm concerned that you know this is a halfway measure and we're going to get stuck here he said you're wrong david in three years we will be back at the negotiating table and we'll wrap this up to a full face or who turn out to be right that the momentum was building to do more now epa signed i can't match in ronald reagan taking the lead on what really required international leadership did he this is an interesting part of the story so we can ask the head of

the epa and george shultz who was his secretary of state work together on this that both took this problem very seriously yeah oh they worked this negotiating position through referred to earlier really taught us that the opposition should be a ninety five percent phase our ten years and shorts and m and thomas got this adopted as the us negotiating closely watched because the other agencies didn't care a weren't paying attention then the industry began alarmed over again that they're willing to limit how fast things grow but some of them are willing to put a freeze on the emission production but they were ready to sign up for four phase out so they went shopping in the reagan administration or summer is a siege to raise issues their champion in donald hotel you're fresh

air until was the secretary of the interior who did refer to are you know just wear sunglasses got it turned out though it may include sound energy producers that he had experience a skin cancer and some historians think that experience motivated to prioritize the issue i asked david if he thinks ryan weighed in on the issue personally i don't know the root we're all the signals that he got a yuri understood this now that shows there's another little incident that our report at one point there was a cabinet meeting about just presided over by ed meese who was the attorney general were closer a lawsuit because he said but he wasn't there are pursuing international treaty forces there are

japanese companies so it's very buttery seventy eight you'll recall the montreal protocol only when some of the way toward a four phase out this year sees its colleagues insisted it was all a maritime until science cruel the connection between csc use in the ozone hole discovery was already happening and it was laying in an article in nineteen eighty six by a team led by susan solomon who was a researcher with the national center for atmospheric research immediately we had a basis to come back in force further action so we actually brought another lawsuit

saying that a halfway measure wasn't enough so you win we replayed the same dynamics where the us under during the bush administration would stop the same interest in having a global solution these changes lives c use the war ii and even faster rate so i asked if there was a fight climate change from his effort to stop the spread of the ozone hole take the story that we just saw threats like on it also tells you know resistance of the industry question is very powerful fossil fuel industries are

much bigger than the chemical companies that make these refrigerators and they can learn some important lessons about obstruction strong emotional experience may learn that reportedly the chemicals industry given to music they learn some obstructed techniques that they have applied with their great effect and the climate treaty negotiations they were in the process during the reagan administration but even more so in the years since of taking over the republican party so they won the whole party is supposed to form of protection special climate protection in the seventies that was so cry was bipartisan and what happened you know it's a symptom of our water political realignment where people have sort of themselves into partisan caps as individuals and then the politicians of sort of themselves into

partisan jabs with funding from the oil and coal and gas industries who were all right wing political causes is very very strong confusion so if you were to offer were optimistic lesson to take away from the side of cs he's happy so two things one is the industry cry while the economy weakened off your humility to call he would be able to keep the medicines cold and in the distribution chain and the economy will fall apart if anything worse under stress but it turned out that when they turned the corner on this they could develop the substance most people don't know that there's a different chemical in their air conditioners one

song there was forty years ago and they're going to have three generations of chemicals a record for another generation refrigerants right now and that doesn't even show up in the price of products that doesn't show up in the way we work and the same thing could be true is true about the innovations we need to solve climate change it turns out that electric cars work really well i see this electricity to muscular more electricity comes from the cheapest sources of electricity in our rules the thing to do would be to build a new call it just isn't happening anymore but it's not enough to rely on the markets on you need to stop them reason we have a clean air act has the marketplace doesn't take note oh the damage and environmental damage their opponents cost you mean how well its pollution standards face downs of these

chemicals to make the market place where proper way to innovate and handover place safer alternatives we know it can work your defenses the best time to climate change would be about twenty years ago the second best time is now and people are now seeing the impacts percentage of people who get that climate change from israel at cost by carbon pollution and industrial chemicals like sea of season agencies they get isn't the support for washing ritual measures as for why i think that we're on the cast was to get through the current administration of a renewed attack on a collision is driving conditions it's been david doniger is the senior strategic director of the climate and clean energy program at the natural resources defense

council that's going to do it for us to keep the conversation going tanaka was not what you thought of the episode masters you questions about his trip said listen you know the backstory virginia we're also on facebook and put a backstory but whatever you do don't see a strange creature new committed supporters provided the joseph abboud formula memorial foundation the johns hopkins university and the national endowment for the additional support provided by the tomatoes fresh ideas in the arts and the environment ryan calo is

a professor of history at the university of virginia it is a professor of humanities and president emeritus of the university of richmond john freeman a professor of history and american studies at yale university nathan connolly is associate professor of history at johns hopkins university so it was created by and do what