Chapter 31. Chapter 31: Environmental Policy

How are U.S. environmental laws established and how does lobbying influence the process? What are some of the major U.S. environmental laws?

Why You Should Care

Environmental laws follow the same legal pathway as any law: They are proposed first as bills in Congress, debated, and voted upon by both houses of Congress. If there are enough “yea” votes, then the law is passed and sent to the president to either sign into law or veto and send back to Congress. The list of important environmental laws in Infographic 31.3 were all signed into law, but how do environmental issues attract enough attention to become bills?

Many environmental issues are not new—they have been issues with varying levels of attention from media, lobbyists, and the general public for decades. Air quality was an issue back in the 1940s in urban areas, but there was a series of smog events that lead to the Clean Air Act in 1970, and industrial air pollution in the 1980s led to acid rain provisions in the 1990 amendment to the Clean Air Act.

Usually, a large event gains attention through media coverage—perhaps a natural disaster, industrial accident, or particularly poignant story of misfortune—which influences the process of establishing an environmental law. For CERCLA, it was the Love Canal tragedy in the late 1970s. For NEPA, it was the growing environmental movement that culminated in the nationwide first Earth Day celebration in 1970. That kind of media attention can give enough push to make a bill that is before the Congress important enough that it reaches a vote.

Also, like other laws, environmental legislation is subject to a wide variety of lobbying. Since environmental issues tend to have wide-reaching economic and social impacts, environmental bills, laws, and regulations attract lobbyists for affected corporations, non-profit environmental groups, and private citizens. For the Clean Water Act, dumping of pollutants in the 1960s led to a widespread grassroots movement to clean up waterways, especially in urban areas. This legislation was opposed by the industries that were freely dumping into those waters, but the groundswell of negative attention was enough that the law was easily passed and signed into law.