Governor Reagan by Lou Cannon

Author:Lou Cannon
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: PublicAffairs
Published: 2012-09-27T00:00:00+00:00

The environmental movement, despite isolated successes in saving endangered species, threatened lakes, and redwood trees, was still struggling to become a mass movement during Reagan’s early years as governor. Gallup began polling on environmental issues in 1965, when only 28 percent of the public considered air pollution a serious problem and only 35 percent were similarly concerned about water pollution. By 1969, these percentages had risen to 69 and 74 percent, respectively.19 This public concern was reflected in the California Legislature, which that year passed a tough water quality act with stiff $6,000-a-day fines for polluters. Reagan signed it into law.

Late in 1969, President Nixon consolidated several public agencies into what (in 1970) became the new Environmental Protection Agency. The public approved, but the environment remained mostly a back-burner issue except when a catastrophe occurred. That happened on January 28, 1969, at a blowout on Union Oil Platform A less than 6 miles off the Santa Barbara coast that caused what was then the worst oil spill in U.S. history. Before the well was capped eleven days later, more than 200,000 gallons of oil had escaped into the Pacific Ocean, coating beaches and killing wildlife.

Contrary to predictions at the time, the long-term biological effects of the spill were negligible. The political impact, however, was enormous. The spill led to suspension of drilling in the federal waters off the central California coast and environmentally radicalized Santa Barbara. Even today, political candidates in the area emphasize their opposition to federal offshore oil drilling.

Drilling in state-regulated waters closer to land continued at a reduced pace. Because state regulations on offshore drilling are stricter than the federal government’s, Reagan was able to finesse the issue. But the blowout at Platform A was a wake-up call. Another call occurred at 2 A.M. on January 19, 1971, when two Standard Oil tankers collided beneath the Golden Gate Bridge in dense fog. They spilled 840,000 gallons of oil that fouled shores and killed many birds. These spills made Reagan aware that environmental issues had a politically explosive potential.

The Santa Barbara oil spill was a particular boon to environmentalists. Sierra Club membership surged. In Sacramento, a new environmental coalition challenged the prevailing orthodoxy that gave priority to agriculture in the Central Valley and urban development in Southern California. This orthodoxy had ancient roots. In America, development had been synonymous with progress since the first European settlers arrived in the New World. As President Johnson’s secretary of the interior Stewart Udall observed, “Every act that overcame the wilderness was considered good. Subjugation meant growth, and growth was next to Godliness in the American scheme of things. Since Plymouth Rock, growth and expansion have been synonymous with survival and success.”

This assumption was bipartisan. Republicans were more likely to favor private initiative (logging redwoods), and the Democrats government action (building high dams), but the difference was in shadings. In a 1948 radio broadcast in which he was introduced by Reagan, Democratic Senate candidate Hubert Humphrey said that the Tennessee Valley Authority

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