Earthday Essay, Research Paper
Earth Day
Earth Day is April 22. Earth Day is most often observed by the media, hundreds of local groups and noted on calendars on April 22. Many people also observe Earth Week and Earth Month. Since most events and festivals need to take place on a weekend, Earth Day is observed on the weekends before and after April 22. Others also observe it on March 21, the Vernal Equinox or on World Environment Day, June 6. Remember, that really, every day is an Earth Day – we just need to live our lives that way.
History of Earth Day
For years prior to Earth Day it had been troubling to me that the critical matter of the state of our environment was simply a non-issue in the politics of our country. The President, the Congress, the economic power structure of the nation, and the press paid almost no attention to this issue, which is of such staggering import to our future. It was clear that until we somehow got this matter into the political arena, until it became a part of the national political dialogue, not much would ever be achieved. The puzzling challenge was to think up some dramatic event that would focus national attention on the environment. Finally, in 1963 an idea occurred to me that was, I thought, a virtual cinch to get the environment into the political limelight once and for all.
That idea was to persuade President Kennedy to give national visibility to this issue by going on a nationwide conservation tour, spelling out in dramatic language the serious and deteriorating condition of our environment, and proposing a comprehensive agenda to begin addressing the problem. No President had ever made such a tour, and I was satisfied this would finally force the issue onto the nation’s political agenda. The President like the idea and began his conservation tour in the fall of 1963. Senators Hubert Humphrey, Gene McCarthy, Joe Clark and I accompanied the President on the first leg of his trip to Pennsylvania, Wisconsin,, and Minnesota. For many reasons the tours didn’t achieve what I had hoped for – it did not succeed in making the environment a national political issue. However, it was the germ of the idea that ultimately flowered into Earth Day.
While the President’s tour was a disappointment, I continued to hope for some idea that would thrust the environment into the political mainstream. Six years would pass before the idea for Earth Day occurred to me in late July 1969, while on a conservation speaking tour out West.
At the time there was a great deal of turmoil on the college campuses over the Vietnam War. Protests, call anti-war teach-ins, were being widely held on campuses across the nation. On a flight from Santa Barbara to the University of California/Berkeley, I read an article on the teach-ins, and it suddenly occurred to me, why not have a nationwide teach-in on the environment? That was the origin of Earth Day.
I returned to Washington in early August, raised the funds to get Earth Day started, and prepared letters to 50 governors and to the mayors of all the major cities explaining the event and requesting that they issue Earth Day Proclamations. I sent an Earth Day article to all of the college newspapers explaining the event and one to Scholastic Magazine, which went to most of our grade and high schools.
In a speech given in Seattle in September, I formally announced that there would be a national environmental teach-in sometime in the spring of 1970. The wire services carried the story nationwide. The response was dramatic. It took off like gangbusters. Telegrams, letters and Telephone inquiries poured in from all over the nation. Using my Senate staff, I ran Earth Day activities out of my office. By December, the movement had expanded so rapidly that it became necessary to open an office in Washington to serve as a National Clearinghouse for Earth Day inquiries and activities, at which point I hired Denis Hayes and others to coordinate the effort.
Earth Day achieved what I had hoped for. The objective was to get a nationwide demo
In was a truly astonishing grassroots explosion, The people cared and Earth Day became the first opportunity they ever had to join in a nationwide demonstration to send a big message to the politicians – a message to tell them to wake up and do something.
It worked because of the spontaneous, enthusiastic response at the grassroots. Nothing like it had ever happened before. While our organizing on college campuses was very well done, the thousands of events in our schools and communities were self-generated at the local level. We had neither the time nor resources to organize the ten thousand grade schools and high schools and one thousand communities that participated. They simply organized themselves. That was the remarkable thing that became Earth Day.
Don’t ever forget, if you want to move the nation to make hard decisions as political issues, the grassroots is the source of power. With it you can do anything – without it, nothing.
If we are going to move the nation to an environmentally sustainable economy, you and that young generation right behind you are going to have to do it – and I think you will.
Earth Day Every Year
Earth Day went for twenty years until Denis Hayes saw both the need and the opportunity to expand the scope of Earth Day internationally. For the 20th anniversary, Earth Day was celebrated by more than 200 million people in 141 countries.
A new organization, the Earth Day Network, has emerged from the seeds that were planted in 1990. The Earth Day Network has been founded by and for the grass roots activists who have taken Earth Day “to heart” in their locales on an annual basis. In 1994 alone, more than one million individuals attended Earth Day events and thousands of volunteers participated in projects in all fifty states.
The mission of the Earth Day Network is to increase awareness, responsibility and action toward a clean, healthy future for all living things using Earth Day as a catalyst. The Network’s focus is people. The Network’s commitment is environmental.
Affiliated groups of the Earth Day Network include: Earth Day Canada, Earth Day New York, Earth Day Illinois, San Diego Earth Day, Earth Day Northwest, Earth Day Hawaii, EarthWays, St. Louis, Clean Air Council,/Philadelphia Earth Day ‘95, Earth Day Greater Boston, Stamford Connecticut Earth Day, Earth Day Georgia, EnviroBaldwin, Fairhope, Alabama, Ecology Action/Earth Day Austin Texas, Michiana Earth Day, Earth Day Arizona, Northern Nevada Earth Day/Environmental Leadership, Reno NV, GLOBE Ecology Coalition, Long Beach CA.
In addition to formal affiliates, the Earth Day Network supports and works with other local volunteer groups around the country. Groups receiving support in 1995 have included: Earth Service, Inc., Los Angeles, Our Planet Dallas TX, Friends of Sugar Creek, Crawfordsville, IN, Eco-Kansas City, Community Recycling Center, Champaign IL, New Bedford MA Earth Day, and Citizens for a Better South Florida, Miami.
The Earth Day Network is working with other organizations throughout the U.S. Please inquire about contacts in your area.
Network Affiliate agreements, Sponsorship policies and Earth Day Organizing Surveys (to list Earth Day activities as part of theannual events list) are available by request.
“If the environment is a fad, then it’s going to be our last fad . . .We are building a movement, a movement with a broad base, a movement which transcends political boundaries. It is a movement that values people more than technology, people more than political boundaries, people more than profit.” April 22, 1970, Denis Hayes, organizer of the first Earth Day and Chair of Earth Day Northwest.
317