Lessons For A Warming Planet – Alejandro E Camacho

Supreme Court has clearly ruled that NEPA’s mandates are procedural in nature.80 Some commentators have argued that NEPA ought to go further than simply consider harms and alternatives. Rather, they argue it ought to be interpreted or changed to require substantive changes to a proposed action in response to anticipated harms, as some state analogs have required.81 Nonetheless, NEPA has served as an invaluable catalyst for environmental protection and democratic participation.

The requirement that environmental harms be considered has grown to inform virtually every aspect of federal discretionary regulatory decision making. Underscoring its influence on environmental law, about half the states and over one hundred other nations replicated NEPA.82 At least as significantly, through its procedural and structural (i.e., interagency consultation) innovations, NEPA promoted a more coordinated administrative state and a more informed and empowered citizenry.

The various federal natural resources laws, for instance, only could be successfully implemented through compliance with NEPA’s mandates for public participation, interagency consultation, and careful judicial review of such decisions.83 For the first time in United States history, pollution control was prominently on the federal policy agenda. The first pollution control law with bite arose in direct response to the Santa Barbara Oil Spill. The spill began just a couple of weeks into Nixon’s term and came from a crack in the ocean floor near one of the wells operated by Union Oil.

The spill resulted in 235,000 gallons of oil fouling the ocean just miles off the coast of Santa Barbara.84 When the black tide came to shore, the oil-saturated water changed the physics of the waves—they no longer broke on Santa Barbara’s beaches. Instead, in eerie silence, waves washed up oil-soaked birds, fish, and sea mammals. Crowds of Californians made their way up the coast to witness the destruction, and the media coverage was intense.

“Provides an expansive treatment of the impact of environmental law in its broadest sense on our nation’s lands, resources, and peoples. In doing so, it offers a valuable perspective on our present-day contestations over natural resource extraction, climate, equity, and environmental protection. —Alexandra B. Klass, James G. Degnan Professor of Law, University of Michigan Law School “Professors Camacho and Daniels provide an engaging history of U.S.

environmental and natural resources laws, and a fresh framework for understanding what features and challenges have emerged and endured in our laws over the past 250 years. Their insights into law, history, and culture provide important lessons for the future of U.S. environmental law.” —Sean Hecht, Managing Attorney, California Regional Office, Earthjustice “This book appears at a time when the United States Government seems determined to abandon or reverse any energy and environmental policy that mitigates global warming and it could not be more needed.

Examining American legal history from the earliest impact of European settlement to the present, the authors explore the broad array of policies that have been adopted both to encourage and rein in the impacts of economic exploitation on nature. The results of this unusually deep assessment of the evolution of environmental law take us well beyond the march of legislation and litigation and inspire new thinking about how to address the current crisis.”

—Mary Nichols, Distinguished Counsel for the Emmett Institute on Climate Change and the Environment, UCLA School of Law, former California Air Resources Board Chair (1979–1983, 2007–20) and California Natural Resources Agency Secretary (1999–2003). OceanofPDF.com LESSONS FOR A WARMING PLANET OceanofPDF.com LESSONS FOR A WARMING PLANET A VITAL HISTORY OF US ENVIRONMENTAL LAW ALEJANDRO E. CAMACHO and BRIGHAM DANIELS New York OceanofPDF.com NEW YORK UNIVERSITY PRESS New York www.nyupress.org © 2026 by New York University All rights reserved Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Camacho, Alejandro E.

author | Daniels, Brigham author Title: Lessons for a warming planet : a vital history of US environmental law / Alejandro E. Camacho and Brigham Daniels. Description: New York : New York University Press, 2026. | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2025042971 (print) | LCCN 2025042972 (ebook) | ISBN 9781479802814 hardcover | ISBN 9781479802852 ebook | ISBN 9781479802838 ebook other Subjects: LCSH: Environmental law—United States—History | Environmental law—Social aspects—United States | Environmental law—Political aspects—United States | Environmental law—Economic aspects—United States Classification: LCC KF3817.C36 2026 (print) | LCC KF3817 (ebook) LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2025042971 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2025042972 This book is printed on acid-free paper, and its binding materials are chosen for strength and durability.

We strive to use environmentally responsible suppliers and materials to the greatest extent possible in publishing our books. The manufacturer’s authorized representative in the EU for product safety is Mare Nostrum Group B.V., Doelen 72, 4831 GR Breda, The Netherlands. Email: [email protected]. The cover art visually represents annual global mean temperature data from 1850 to 2024 as colored tree ring stripes.

This is a short excerpt from the opening of “” by Unknown, quoted for review and introduction purposes. All rights belong to the copyright holders.

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• ISBN: 9781479802814, 9781479802852, 9781479802838
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• Language: English (en)

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