Earth Day 2001

By Sen. Gaylord Nelson, Founder of Earth Day (reprinted by permission from The Wilderness Society's web site: http://earthday.wilderness.org)

Building a sustainable society is the critical challenge of this century. Everything depends on it.

- Sen. Gaylord Nelson, Founder, Earth Day

April 22nd will be the 31st Anniversary of Earth Day. In the largest demonstration of its kind in history, millions expressed their dismay over what was happening to the environment around them and their alarm over the indifference to it by the political leaders of the country.

We are all in debt to that 70's generation of young folks-grade school, high school, and college-who supplied the energy, enthusiasm, and idealism that forced environmental concerns into the political arena for the first time.

A Challenge for the 21st Century

What a legacy that 70's generation left us! And now, what a wonderful opportunity the current generation of students has to build and expand on that legacy. Indeed, if this new generation of students can persuade the political establishment to initiate a national dialogue on sustainability it will mark another turning point in our history because only such a dialogue will provide the information and public understanding necessary to guide us on a path to sustainability.

No modern society is currently sustainable over the long-term because all are consuming capital and counting it on the profit side of the ledger. Any business that spends its capital and counts it as profit is headed for bankruptcy. A nation is no different. After all, a nation's capital (its wealth, so to speak) is the air, water, soil, forests, minerals, rivers, lakes, oceans, scenic beauty, wildlife habitats and bio-diversity. Take this away and all that is left is a wasteland. As we pollute, erode and degrade our resource base we are spending capital. Obviously, this is not a sustainable situation in the long term.

Forging A Sustainable Society

Forging a sustainable society is our first and most important order of business. The third international conference on sustainability is scheduled for June 2002. Although it will soon be 10 years since the first international conference, we have not yet begun a national discussion on what sustainability means and why it is important. That is a failure of past congresses and presidents. Here's what must happen to set our country on the path of sustainability:

1. The President must begin a national dialogue on the issue of sustainability by beginning a tradition of a biennial “State of the Environment” address. This biennial message would be in addition to the traditional State of the Union address.

2. The Congress must undertake a comprehensive series of educational hearings on the concept and significance of sustainability.

3. The public must encourage serious Presidential and congressional attention to the issue of sustainability.

4. The youth of America are also involved, making it clear to the President and Congress that sustainability is essential to the security of our nation.

Since sustainability is everyone's concern, we should all be actively involved, particularly the youth of America who will inherit whatever environment we leave behind.

You can make a difference-write to The President and your Congressional Representative. Ask the President to give a biennial message on the State of the Environment; and ask the Congress to begin hearings on sustainability.

This Earth Day 2001 Message is brought to you by Gaylord Nelson, Founder of Earth Day,
the North American Coalition on Religion and Ecology, and The Wilderness Society.

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