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Rachel Carson's Silent Spring: The Rise Of The EPA

976 Words4 Pages

Imagine never being able to go swimming in a lake or ocean again because there is too much garbage and waste in it. Imagine never being able to eat seafood again because all sea animals are dead because of chemicals in the water. 45 years ago that was the outlook for the United States of America if laws did not change. America would be going down hill quickly. On December 2, 1970 the Environmental Protection Agency was created. Before then there was no major corporation or any policies that protected the environment. It was when things were getting to their worse, the government decided to fix things. The EPA has certainly had a major impact on the US environment; in particular by addressing the issues in the country, adding guidelines and …show more content…

President Nixon created the idea of the EPA in 1970. The EPA was the first act of the whole century. Fifteen federal companies were brought together into one big independent US agency (The World Book Encyclopedia), but later many more were added. Ideas for this agency started around 1962 when pollution was getting bad. One book that had a strong impact on the starts of this movement was Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring. This book caused a revolution throughout the public because of “the exhaustively researches, carefully reasoned, and beautifully written attack on the indiscriminate use of pesticides” (EPA). Silent Spring made scientist lawyers and many other hardworking Americans start fighting for environmental protection. In 1969 Russell E. Train, Secretary of the Interior, said “If environmental deterioration is permitted to continue and increase at present rates, [man] wouldn’t stand a snowball’s chance in hell [of surviving]”. He basically said that if things were not changed soon, humanity has no chance of surviving in the long run. When the EPA first started they had three initial ideas for the purpose of the agency; efforts to prevent damage to the environment, create national programs to bring humanity and the environment together, and to create more groups to enhance humanity’s understanding of the

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In this essay, I will argue that the environmental and energy crisis of the 1970s, did usher in a period of decline in the United States. The beginning of the 1970’s was an era, where Americans were under-siege with energy and environmental decline. In the early 1970’s the United States oil consumption was at an all-time high, while the domestic oil production was declining. Foreign dependence was steadily rising.

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