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ESA at 50: Celebrating the Nation’s Most Effective Environmental Law
December 28th marks the 50th Anniversary of the Endangered Species Act (ESA), widely regarded as America’s most potent and effective environmental law.
The Act has saved hundreds of species from extinction, and is overwhelmingly popular with the American voters.
- Erik Molvar
- CounterPunch
When it originally passed in 1973, to be signed by President Nixon, it carried the Senate unanimously and won a bipartisan majority of 390 in favor to 12 against.
Preventing extinction, it turns out, is a bedrock American value.
The strength of the ESA is its legal requirement that decisions must be made solely based on the best available science, sidelining politics.
In the absence of this law’s…