Water Pollution Control Act of 1948
The Federal Water Pollution Control Act of 1948 was the first major law enacted by Congress to address the problems of water pollution in the United States. It did little to control pollution, gave only limited authority to the federal government, and provided an extremely cumbersome enforcement mechanism. In 1972 Congress totally rewrote the act to provide adequate protection for the nation's waters. The legislation applied only to interstate waters, eliminating from protection heavily polluted waters that were wholly contained within one state.
Cry Wolf Quotes
As a matter of fact, acid mine drainage acts as a germicide and renders harmless great quantities of sewage pollution now flowing into the streams of the Nation. Any attempt to compel the treatment of mine drainage at the source is an economic waste, as it robs the people of the benefit of the purifying action of the streams, and the streams are necessary to carry off our liquid wastes, as they can be handled in no other way.
We are a small-town industry. We are the sixth largest industry in the United States, but we are essentially a small-town industry. If a paper mill is shut down, it isn’t the mill and its employees that are affected, but the whole community, and we have hundreds of towns and small communities in the United States that might be liquidated if this weren’t handled in a reasonable manner. That is just a fact, and it is a very real situation to us.
Experience has also shown that there is another aspect of the problem which, by exciting hasty and improvident legislation, delays progress. I refer to the unpleasant connotation which surrounds the word ‘pollution.’ The public is likely to think of that word in terms of sewage and epidemics. I am told, however, that industrial waste is not a menace to public health….it is sewage which does the harm....
At this time, when the Government and the citizens are vitally concerned with the reduction of public expense and when the already overburdened taxpayers are protesting against the continuation of unnecessary taxes, it would be unwise to pass such bills which would launch the Government into the establishment of one more Federal bureau whose maintenance would cost the taxpayers a staggering sum.
