Career-staff leaks and congressional oversight forced Reagan’s anti-environment appointees to resign

Evidence

The resulting whipsaw created by damaging reports and occasional leaks from career employees within the environmental agencies and legislative oversight hearings at which administration actions were denounced overwhelmed much of the Reagan administration’s efforts to reform federal environmental policies. As previously described, the administration’s confrontation with Congress and its massive institutional oversight machinery was the decisive factor in ultimately causing Gorsuch, Watt, and a number of other lower-cabinet-level environmental appointees to resign. — Richard J. Lazarus, The Making of Environmental Law, 535

Categorization

• XREF: Links to the earlier chapter claims about career-staff leaks as a check on political appointees. — connects to: Environmental law survived the loss of presidential support through Congress, courts, and advocacy groups. — Richard J. Lazarus, The Making of Environmental Law, 372; Career-staff leaks and judicial review check political appointees who ignore disclosed impacts — Richard J. Lazarus, The Making of Environmental Law, 396; Moderate Republican committee chairs blocked Reagan’s environmental rollbacks in the 1980s. — Richard J. Lazarus, The Making of Environmental Law, 672

Broader Connections

• Moderate Republican committee chairs blocked Reagan’s environmental rollbacks in the 1980s. #corroborates (0.78) — Richard J. Lazarus, The Making of Environmental Law, 672