Question of the Week: Which presidents do you think did the most to protect the environment, and why?
Posted on February 9th, 2009 - 10:30 AMEach week we ask a question related to the environment. Please let us know your thoughts as comments. Feel free to respond to earlier comments or post new ideas. Previous questions.
From Thomas Jefferson to Theodore Roosevelt to today, American presidents have worked, with considerable power and influence, to preserve and protect America’s environment and natural resources. February 16 is Presidents Day.
Which presidents do you think did the most to protect the environment, and why?
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Question of the Week
February 9th, 2009 at 7:13 pm
Theodore Roosevelt because he defined American conservation policy for decades to come. Richard Nixon because NEPA and other seminal statutes were formulated, supported, and passed on his watch. Jimmy Carter because so many of the forward looking alternative energy technologies we will turn to soon were pioneered as DOE demonstration projects supported by his administration.
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February 9th, 2009 at 10:39 pm
Richard M. Nixon arguably did the most to protect the environment. Although many previous and subsequent presidents made contributions by founding national parks, promoting conservation and eliminating sources of pollution, Nixon made a huge impact. Although it is not widely known, two groundbreaking environmental initatives took place under his guidance as president, the establishment of the EPA and the passage of the clean water act. These two actions definitely set the stage for modern environmental protection by giving the government the utmost authority to protect the environment and setting up a framework for organizing scientific, economic and political action that addresses environmental protection.
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February 10th, 2009 at 10:47 am
Obama. Energy efficiency, renewable energy and smart grid in the stimulus package. This is the first step on the path to global sustainability.
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Tim reply on February 11, 2009 7:52 am:
The question of the week was: Which presidents do you think did the most to protect the environment, and why? Though Obama may contribute significantly to the environmental movement, we can not credit his administration for this before they actually accomplish it.
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Rachel reply on February 11, 2009 5:03 pm:
Agreed.
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bethany reply on February 12, 2009 2:32 pm:
agreed
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Bart reply on February 11, 2009 9:49 pm:
Spoken like a true liberal. How about patting Obama on the back after he’s actually completed the task successfully.
The question was “Which presidents do you think did the most to protect the environment, and why?” The operative word here is DID, not trying or attempting. The “stimulus package” hasn’t even fully passed through Congress yet.
I agree with Tim.
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February 10th, 2009 at 10:50 am
In my memory (I am 38), I would say Jimmy Carter as I do not have a lot of knowledge about Nixon. At least with Carter, there was some change in response to energy crisis of the 1970’s.
Personally, I think it is a crime to have had Bush do nothing to foster conservation in light of the response to oil dependence and relations with middle East/Iraq War; still the SUV is prevailing car in the US as I see it in my personal driving in the South.
And, I think is a crime to have to look back and really think hard to decide this and I am thinking nobody recently…except Albert Gore who was not actually president. I do have better hopes for Obama and the present as maybe things can change for the better.
But in North Mississippi, we are not recycling on the curb. Everyone is spraying the grass with 24D, chemlawn. All garbage is sent to landfill and I am only one in grocer with the reusable bags; my conclusion is that we are in environmental stone age here.
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Janet Lalor reply on February 27, 2009 11:38 pm:
Michelle,
Ask your grocer to start carrying reusable green bags. The can get their name and logo printed on the bag for permanent advertising. You can also ask them to print an incentive on their paper bags to say that they will give the customer 10cents off their bill for every paper bag a customer brings in and reuses. Getting out of the stone age has to start somewhere, let it start with you!
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February 10th, 2009 at 11:00 am
President Nixon does deserve credit for signing many important pieces of legislation into law, but I think he’s overrated as an environmentalist for several reasons. Some of the landmark legislation he signed had passed by such overwhelming margins that a veto would have been easily overridden. We also now know from the White House tapes that he viewed supporting the environment as a diversion to get liberals off his back.
President Clinton deserves great credit for slowing the liquidation of old growth forests and conserving 58.5 million acres of roadless forests, both of which have protected important wildlife habitats, and saved significant carbon emissions if these areas had been logged. President Clinton also made an effort to address climate change directly by offering global leadership.
President George W. Bush is unquestionably the worst environmentalist because of his policy of global warming denial and inaction, efforts to reverse numerous environmental protections of clean air, water, and lands, favoring oil and coal over alternative energy solutions, and favoring a pro-industry ideology over the experience and knowledge of scientists and agency professionals.
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cassie reply on February 12, 2009 2:34 pm:
you are so right
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February 10th, 2009 at 11:14 am
The facile answer is probably Nixon: created the Council of Environmental Quality, signed NEPA, and solely created EPA all in one year! But the best way to improve the environment is to increase personal wealth. There is a direct and strong connection between secure economic conditions and environmental improvement (e.g., lower birth rates, greater protection of habitat, reduction in harmful practices such as burning wood, etc.). Like it or not, the President in recent memory that promoted greatest economic growth here and around the globe: Ronald Reagan.
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Frank reply on February 13, 2009 8:09 pm:
Nice try, Marcus. But the correct concept is that environmental protection and economic growth MUST go hand-in-hand; and they both fail if one leads the other. And Ronald Reagan? Reagan so deeply killed incentives in energy conservation (begun by President Carter) that only now are people starting to talk about incentives again. Reagan got Ann Burford, then-Administrator of EPA, to try to reduce EPA so violently that Congress had to get rid of her, send her people to prison, and start EPA over with Bill Ruckelshaus, the first EPA Administrator (under Nixon). Reagan was all for mining and drilling American wild public lands, led by James ” a black, a woman, two Jews and a cripple” Watt. Ronald Reagan, and perhaps you too Marcus, might have long ago forgotten all that darkness in the 1980s (much of it recurring in the Bush 2000s). The rest of us haven’t.
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Lee Cressey reply on March 1, 2009 8:38 pm:
Let us not forget that Carter was the first and only president to install solar panels on the white house. When Reagan took office, the solar panels were the first that came down.
It is imperative that environmental needs go hand in hand with economic needs. However, Marcus is right to some extent. Economic wealth does lend a person more time to think about the environmental issues in comparison to someone who has more pressing needs on their mind, such as paying rent, or putting food on the table.
That is what the environmental movement fails to address. They leave out the poor and minority communities in their attempts to change the world. There is a tendency to care more for the far off whale or manatee than there is addressing the very needs of the people suffering in the ports and poor communities in our own backyard. Too often those communities suffer the worst environmental atrocities from air quality, to contaminated soil and water.
To take it a step further – Who was most affected by the environmental neglect that led to tropical storm Katrina upgrading to a full blown hurricane when it hit the global warmed waters of the Gulf of Mexico?
Economic growth and Environmental concerns can only be a success, if we include everyone in the community, rich and poor. We can’t afford to leave anyone out.
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February 10th, 2009 at 11:19 am
I do not think that many of our Presidents did much for the environment. If one takes a look at history, I think that you will find that until any President takes the role of forcing many of our government agencies to abide by the laws Congress has established, you will not see improvement in the environment. Also until you get the relationship between government agencies, big business and the good olde boy programs corrected you will not see improvement. A perfect example of this is the Tar Creek Superfund Site here in Oklahoma. Politics is one thing, following the law is another and many of the government agencies have taken the postion that they are above the federal law and the federal law does not apply to them
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February 10th, 2009 at 11:23 am
All the Presidents right from Thomas Jefferson to Theodore Roosevelt, and Richard Nixon to John Kennedy, and Ronald Regan, George W. Bush,Sr., Bill Clinton to George W. Bush, Jr. made significant contributions. What matter most the real problem of environment has started from last 20 years or so. Let us see right from Melting Ice in Antartica to Deplition of Ozone layer. Global warming has strarted showing its real colour. Water level of sea is increasing dramatically. Ice in hills are melting fast and strange but real change in nature law such as unpredicatble season behaviour. All these are dangerous sign and world can not simply avoid it. If they do so, next generation will be facing drastic consequences. I feel Mr. Al Gore is doing great job and Mr. Clinton has also done wonderful job. BUT I WOULD LIKE TO SAY MR. GEORGE W. BUSH, JR., AS IT IS HIS TERM WHEN THE PROBLEM HAS INCREASED DRAMATICALLY AND MR. BUSH HAS SUPPORTED THIS DURING HIS FOREIGN TRIPS, SUCH AS IN INDIA. MR. AL GORE HARD WORK,VISION AND SINCERE EFFORTS AND MR. BUSH SUPPORT MAKE MR. GEORGE W. BUSH A WINNER. YES, MR. OBAMA HAS AN OPPORTUNITY TO DO THE WONDER IN THIS REGARD. LAST BUT NOT LEAST : ALL THE WONDERFUL PEOPLE, ORGANIZATIONS INVOLVED IN THIS. GOD BLESS YOU ALL AND YOU ALL ARE MAKING THE DIFFERENCE! Mrigender Chauhan
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Jen reply on February 17, 2009 12:18 pm:
Get off your soap box.
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February 10th, 2009 at 12:05 pm
Theodore Roosevelt was the first president active in conservation. Richard Nixon passed the Clean Water Act after he created the Environmental Protection Association, though he was an impeached president.
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Marcus reply on February 14, 2009 2:58 pm:
Um . . . just for the record, Nixon was not impeached.
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February 10th, 2009 at 12:46 pm
I would like to make two selections for the case worth to mention;
First: Dwight David “Ike” Eisenhower the 34th President of the United states, because he was the first that mention something very fundamental for the infrastructure of the renewable energy resources management to now days as well: the need for a common administration national energy network, so crucial for our security as well. (Smart thinking allowed me to say.)
And of course, the 44th Presidency, the Obama presidency.
Thank you.
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Matt reply on February 11, 2009 8:35 am:
Obama? Really? Three weeks in and “of course” Obama’s done the most! Let me guess, you also think Bush was the worst, Clinton and Carter were also pretty teriffic and Nixon no so good. I’m starting to see a trend here. For this board to remain meaningful, the contributors should use their minds to actually think about what they are saying. That way we can all benefit from each other’s insight.
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holls reply on February 28, 2009 10:36 am:
i second that….
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February 10th, 2009 at 1:12 pm
Let me make sure I understand the question…. “did the most to protect the environment…”.
I don’t know what this question actually means. Does this mean protect wild life, our air, our water? Or is this more of a holistic question? How do you compare the original enactment of the CAA when there were few if any emission controls required versus creating a vast new national parklands. Or how do you compare improvements to the CAA to the original implementation of the CAA?
In my humble opinion, President Richard Nixon did the most, hands down. The previous commentors did not include the Endangered Species Act which originated in his adminstration.
He also created the Environmental Protection Agency, which many of the commentors on this board work for, signed into law the Clean Air Act and the Clean Water Act, if i’m not mistaken. He also did this while occupied with the Vietnam War. Many people believe the CAA and CWA were passed as legislation without his help, but he did sign, not veto, the legislation and did this while trying to control inflation, increasing social security benefits dramatically, and including annual cost of living increases into social security.
An example of a President that did not do much is President Bill Clinton that chose to wile away two years of control of congress and the white house without doing much, then wait until the final weeks in office before signing Executive Orders to create vast new parks in western states. He could have done that at any time during his administration but waited until the last week, unlike President Nixon that took nearly two administrations to negotiate and enact laws in conjunction with congress.
If I’m not mistaken, he also created OSHA.
It is easy for many liberal minded folks to dislike him, but in reality, he did more for our society and environmental policies than any living president that I am aware of in a time of increasing civil unhappiness nationwide. It is easy for folks to point to the break-in at the DNC and ensuing coverup and all together forget his foreign, domestic and environmental policy achievements.
I can’t wait to see the responses to this post.
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February 10th, 2009 at 1:49 pm
The US Environment has an experienced a continuous degredation during the entire history of our nation. As such no president including the current one has acted to protect the environment. A more accurate question would be “Which president destroyed the environment the least, and which president destroyed it the most?” Certainly the Bush Era Denial of Global Warming has had a catastrophic effect on the planet and the human race, resulting in a unique confusion in the minds of the American Public on this issue — unique compared to the understanding of the citizens of any other nation on the planet. The fact that this issue has become tied to Republican vs Democrat, Liberal vs. Conservative, and Christian vs. Other Christians is also unique to the United States. Other countries don’t seem to have these divisons or this confusion!
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Marcus reply on February 14, 2009 3:04 pm:
Um . . . I don’t know where you get the idea there has been continuous degradation. Major air pollutants (ozone, lead, SOx, etc.) in the US have all decreased dramatically in the last 30 years and virtually every waterway is cleaner. Thank you EPA!
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February 10th, 2009 at 3:10 pm
(1) Theodore Roosevelt for promoting conservation and using executive powers to preserve wildlife. (2) Richard Nixon for establishing EPA. (3) Thomas Jefferson for the promoting the Lewis & Clark Expedition and other research. Obama has the potential to rewrite the books but it’s too early to claim any achievements.
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February 11th, 2009 at 3:54 am
In my memory ,I would say Jimmy Carter as I do not have a lot of knowledge about Nixon. At least with Carter, there was some change in response to energy crisis of the 1970’s.
Personally, I think it is a crime to have had Bush do nothing to foster conservation in light of the response to oil dependence and relations with middle East/Iraq War; still the SUV is prevailing car in the US as I see it in my personal driving in the South.
And, I think is a crime to have to look back and really think hard to decide this and I am thinking nobody recently…except Albert Gore who was not actually president. I do have better hopes for Obama and the present as maybe things can change for the better.
But in North Mississippi, we are not recycling on the curb. Everyone is spraying the grass with 24D, chemlawn. All garbage is sent to landfill and I am only one in grocer with the reusable bags; my conclusion is that we are in environmental stone age here.
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February 11th, 2009 at 9:49 am
Before my time, I’d take Teddy Roosevelt for his conservation efforts and Richard Nixon for the Clear Air/Water Acts and creation of USEPA.
However, in my time, I would have to say Ronald Reagan. If it wasn’t for his EPA, the 503 Program regulations would never have gone into effect, and the heavy metals accumulated in sewage treatment plant sludge would still be going to landfills today. My organization had to hire over 40 employees (Pollution Control Officers and Technicians) in order to reduce the high lead/Zinc/Copper levels coming into the POTWs in my district.
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February 11th, 2009 at 12:07 pm
I don’t know, but I would think Jimmy Carter or Bill Clinton. The Republicans believe in allowing big business freedoms to do whatever they need to make money.
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Matt reply on February 11, 2009 3:07 pm:
yea
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Marcus reply on February 14, 2009 3:07 pm:
I have a theory that the people who are most bothered by stereotyping, stereotype the most. Just a theory, mind you.
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Kevin Tohill reply on February 17, 2009 6:36 pm:
Although “I don’t know” is a great way to state your beliefs with conviction, a little research would easily thwart the partisan assumbtions bandied about here. If Carter’s “alternative energy” focus was so successful 30 years ago, where are the alternatives? Why did he allow nuclear power to be shut down completely, resulting in the largest growth of coal and diesel power plants on the planet? Additionally, many environmental scientists argue that the “cap and trade” system Clinton established is nothing more than a pay to pollute system. Even democrats now argue that it is ineffective. If you insist on calling out partisan accomplishments I have to remind you that Nixon presided over the establishment of the EPA and George H.W. Bush signed in the greatest wetlands protection initiative in our history.
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February 11th, 2009 at 2:48 pm
President George Bush accomplished an enormous amount in toxics reduction, greenhouse gas reduction, and energy conservation through the huge number of partnerships with industry, cities and other nations. GHG reduction is being pursued in this country and around the globe through partnerships like Climate Partners in the U.S. and Methane to Market in countries around globe. Persistent pollutants were pursued under the NPEP (National Partnership for Environmental Priorities) and through ratification of UN treaty on banning persistent organic compounds. Energy conservation was pursued through an expanded Energy Star program and the enactment of new CAFE gas mileage standards. An EPA career officer said in November that President Bush actually met his goal for the reduction of carbon intensity for this country through the voluntary partnerships. We may not have seen the regulations, but we have the results. Due to the bigger economy now than that in President Roosevelt’s day and the global reach of the partnerships, President Bush actually reduced the most GHG pollutants among all the presidents.
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February 12th, 2009 at 7:28 am
I don’t believe we can assess environmental impacts solely on the basis of environmental legislation. Political actions and economic policies also have an impact on the environment. A political decision to go to war, for example, will have a major impact on the environment, and throughout history, the environment has even been used as a weapon during times of war (deliberate flooding by bombing dams, poisoning of water, fires). The economic stimulus package will also have a significant environmental impact, as it essentially is meant to stimulate the consumption of natural resources – all the things required to build cars, bridges, homes, etc. and the energy needed to make and run them.
But perhaps the question of the week is a little unfair, since it focuses on just one person. In 1990 (Bush years), the pollution control act was passed which established pollution prevention as national policy to guide our efforts to create a cleaner environment. Yet from the comments of Michelle and Leo and others, it takes both time and a lot of cooperation for the good intentions of many of our presidents to become part of everyday life for the average American.
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February 12th, 2009 at 11:15 am
Presidents Nixon and Ford probably did more to pioneer legislation to bring the environment into the national light and begin the daunting task of cleaning up all of the country’s past practices. During their administrations, all the environmental and transportation acts were passed and signed. The EPA, OSHA, and the DOT were established and given authority to promulgate rules and regulations. Regardless of the historical down fall of President Nixon, he was instrumental in forging environmenal legislation. President Ford carried the torch into his administration and term in office. President Carter carried on in some respects, but it wasn’t until President Reagan was instrumental in pushing through the reauthorization acts and expanded environmental cleanup regulations.
But the real pioneer was Teddy Roosevelt. As an avid ourdoorsman and hunter, he realized the need to preserve portions of the country’s natural beauty. Hooray for Roosevelt.
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February 12th, 2009 at 9:22 pm
My choice would be Teddy R and Bill Clinton.
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February 13th, 2009 at 1:48 pm
Which president did the most to protect the environment? My vote is for Teddy Roosevelt.
But I think the question of which president did the most to protect the environment is a nice mind exercise, but not as important as it sounds. Politicians and other “pie in the sky” thinkers can put out all the theories, and all the laws and regulations they want. Its up to the country as a whole to act environmentally responsible, and turn those theories, laws and regulations into reality. The factory worker that suggests new ways to recycle scrap material, scientists that find more environmentally acceptable substitutes for hazardous raw materials, engineers that design cleaner processes, carpoolers, volunteers that maintain national forest trails, etc…these are the real heroes of environmental stewardship! That’s where the rubber meets the road!
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February 13th, 2009 at 5:49 pm
Theodore Roosevelt because he added to the national forests in the West, reserved lands for public use, and fostered great irrigation projects!
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February 16th, 2009 at 6:40 am
I would have to say Theodore Roosevelt. Had he not taken the steps he did, we could have lost a lot. He had serioius foresight to be able to recognize that parcels of land needed to be set aside in order to preserve the natural beauty.
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February 20th, 2009 at 4:27 pm
I find the question a little odd in the first place. Not only does it suggest a certain partisan undertone that’s thankfully been absent from Greenversations, it also suggests a greater role for President’s in protecting and cleaning up our environment than the actually have. Most of the credit goes to individuals whether in federal and state agencies, businesses, or local citizen groups.
And unfortunately many of the comments are classic examples of people who simply repeat conventional wisdom without primary knowledge or data to back up their sweeping statements.
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