This book sets out the case for Hard Green, a conservative environmental agenda. Modern environmentalism, Peter Huber argues, destroys the environment. Captured as it has been by the Soft Green oligarchy of scientists, regulators, and lawyers, modern environmentalism does not conserve forests, oceans, lakes, and streams - it hastens their destruction. For all its scientific pretension, Soft Green is not green at all. Its effects are the opposites of green. This book lays out the alternative: a return to Yellowstone and the National Forests, the original environmentalism of Theodore Roosevelt and the conservation movement. Chapter by chapter, Hard Green takes on the big issues of environmental discourse from scarcity and pollution to efficiency and waste disposal. This is the Hard Green manifesto: Rediscover TAR. Reaffirm the conservationist ethic. Expose the Soft Green fallacy. Reverse the Soft Green agenda. Save the environment from the environmentalists.

A wealthy textile titan from Carlisle, Pennsylvania, Frank Masland Jr. was an ardent political conservative and an equally fervent conservationist who was well known and highly respected in the mid-twentieth-century environmental preservation community. This eye-opening biography charts Masland’s life work, telling the story of how he and fellow Republicans worked with Democrats to expand the national park system, preserve wild country, and protect the environment. Though a conservative conservationist appears to be a contradiction in terms today, this was not necessarily the case when Masland and his compatriots held sway. Conservatives, Masland insisted, had a duty to be good stewards of the earth for present and future generations, and they worked closely with members of both parties in Congress and nonpolitical conservation groups to produce landmark achievements. When conservatives turned against environmentalism during the Reagan presidency, Masland refused to join what historians have termed the “Republican reversal.” During his long life of nearly a hundred years, Masland used his voice, influence, experiences with nature, and considerable wealth to champion environmental causes at the national, state, and local levels. Engaging, informative, and at times eyebrow-raising, this portrait of a passionately anti-statist nature-loving Republican environmentalist documents the history of the twentieth-century conservation movement and reminds us of a time when conservative Republicans could work with liberal Democrats to protect the environment.

Roger Scruton here makes a plea to rescue environmental politics from the activist movements and to return them to the people. The book defends the legacy of home-building and practical reasoning with which ordinary human beings solve their environmental problems, and attacks the alarmism and hysteria that are being used to uproot these resources, while putting nothing coherent in their place.

In the history of American environmentalism, Russell E. Train plays a starring role. Few individuals have been so influential in creating the United States' environmental policies and encouraging conservation efforts around the world. In this absorbing new biography, J. Brooks Flippen describes Train's significance within the fascinating history of the contemporary environmental movement. A lifelong Republican, Train left a successful judicial career to found the African Wildlife Leadership Foundation. As the problems of pollution and unrestrained growth became apparent, he adopted a more ecological approach to nature and became a leader of the emerging environmental movement of the 1960s. He soon headed the Conservation Foundation, one of the first organizations to appreciate that humans represent only one strand in the "web of life." President Richard Nixon appointed Train as the initial chairman of the Council on Environmental Quality just as the country celebrated its first Earth Day. There he helped craft the most important environmental legislation in U.S. history. After three years, he became administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, enforcing regulations during the Energy Crisis and much of the troubled 1970s. With the election of Democrat Jimmy Carter, Train returned to the private sector as head of the American affiliate of the World Wildlife Fund. He found himself increasingly at odds with many Republicans as a new, more ideological brand of conservatism grew and bipartisanship faded. Train's Republican credentials and environmental advocacy made him a vestige of the past and, in a sense, a hope for the future. Given complete access to the personal papers and recollections of Russell Train, Flippen casts an unbiased eye on this remarkable man and the causes he has so fervently promoted. Of a prominent Washington family, Train has known every president from Herbert Hoover to George W. Bush. His life and career illustrate the political dynamics of modern environmentalism and illuminate the insider culture of Washington, D.C.

" Durnil's attack on chlorine is] one of the single boldest environmental policy ideas of the 1990's.... The message is that if someone as conventional and as conservative as Mr. Durnil can latch on to one of the great social transformations of the American century, then so can every other Republican in the country." --New York Times Book Review "This is a serious, thoughtful book. If they would read it, the phoney 'conservatives' now performing in the center ring in Congress might be shamed into mending their ways. --Village Voice Literary Supplement "Here comes a thoughtful, experienced conservative with impeccable Republican credentials a dedicated environmentalist with a different point of view. A thoughtful, readable mandate."--Ken Bode, Moderator, Washington Week in Review

“Regardless of your place on the political spectrum, there is much to admire in this book, which reminds us that the stewardship of nature is an obligation shared by all Americans.” —U.S. Senator Angus S. King Jr. The Green movement in America has lost its way. Pew polling reveals that the environment is one of the two things about which Republicans and Democrats disagree most. Congress has not passed a landmark piece of environmental legislation for a quarter-century. As atmospheric CO2 continues its relentless climb, even environmental insiders have pronounced “the death of environmentalism.” In Getting to Green, Frederic C. Rich argues that meaningful progress on urgent environmental issues can be made only on a bipartisan basis. Rich reminds us of American conservation’s conservative roots and of the bipartisan political consensus that had Republican congressmen voting for, and Richard Nixon signing, the most important environmental legislation of the 1970s. He argues that faithfulness to conservative principles requires the GOP to support environmental protection, while at the same time he criticizes the Green movement for having drifted too far to the left and too often appearing hostile to business and economic growth. With a clear-eyed understanding of past failures and a realistic view of the future, Getting to Green argues that progress on environmental issues is within reach. The key is encouraging Greens and conservatives to work together in the space where their values overlap—what the book calls “Center Green.” Center Green takes as its model the hugely successful national land trust movement, which has retained vigorous bipartisan support. Rich’s program is pragmatic and non-ideological. It is rooted in the way America is, not in a utopian vision of what it could become. It measures policy not by whether it is the optimum solution but by the two-part test of whether it would make a meaningful contribution to an environmental problem and whether it is achievable politically. Application of the Center Green approach moves us away from some of the harmful orthodoxies of mainstream environmentalism and results in practical and actionable positions on climate change, energy policy, and other crucial issues. This is how we get to Green.

Is ?conservative environmentalism? an oxymoron? Is more environmental regulation good for business? The Greening of Conservative America contends that the adherents to any well-considered conservative political philosophy should, on first principles, support pro-conservation, pro-environment policies. Furthermore, and pragmatically, Bliese demonstrates with repeated examples how environmental protection policies actually benefit business by stimulating greater efficiency and innovation and by spurring the creation of green products and services for new markets around the globe. These ideas are applied in chapters on specific environmental issues, including pollution, global warming, biodiversity, public-land management, and sustainability. The book concludes with criticisms of ?free-market environmentalism? and calls conservatives back to their root principles on matters of the environment. Concerned citizens of any political persuasion will find much in this book to inform their views on public debates over environmental issues and policies.