Forty eight years ago, on this day, October 3, 1975, a couple of members of Congress (One Republican and two Democrat) introduced some legislation. It failed, but next year…
“In October 1975, Brown, Lawrence Winn (R-KS), and Phillip Hayes (D-IN) introduced the first bill in American history to establish a national climate program: U.S. House of Representatives, 94th Cong., 1st sess., H.R. 10013, A Bill to Authorize and Direct the Establishment of a Coordinated National Program Relating to Climate (Washington, DC: Government Printing
Office, 1975). First attempt at climate program legislation https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/94/hr10013
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 331ppm. As of 2023 it is 423ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The context was that there had been ongoing concern about changing weather patterns, famines, ice ages, you name it. So having George Brown and others try and get some money for science and scientists is not terribly surprising. You’d had by this point Wally Broekers article in Science as well…
What I think we can learn from this
Decent politicians – and they do exist – try and mobilise state funding for decent science it’s always an uphill battle
What happened next
the bill fell as these sorts of bills usually do first time round Brown persisted and and in 1977 Jimmy Carter signed the first climate act meanwhile in the United Kingdom and Australia they were f****** around and would ultimately find out
What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.