Environmental statutes are radical redistributive acts passed through deliberately conservative institutions

Evidence

Now, with the benefit of more than twenty-five years of hindsight, I realize that there was far more force to his intuition than my own youthful self-assuredness allowed me to perceive. … As a twenty-one-year-old, I was not surprisingly unappreciative of the relative youth of events, institutions, and laws then in existence for fewer than five years. I also lacked any comprehension of how extraordinary it was for such laws to have been enacted in light of their enormously radical redistributive thrust and the inherently and deliberately conservative nature of the nation’s lawmaking institutions. Nor could I predict the strength and tenacity of the efforts that would attack the redistributive impact of new environmental protection laws. — Richard J. Lazarus, The Making of Environmental Law, 18

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: U.S. environmental law has survived every political assault and grown stronger after each — Richard J. Lazarus, The Making of Environmental Law, 21; The 1995 Contract with America targeted environmental law on four specific fronts — Richard J. Lazarus, The Making of Environmental Law, 23; Landmark environmental statutes aspired to constitutional-level transformation, not ordinary lawmaking — Douglas A. Kysar, Regulating from Nowhere: Environmental…, 640 (+3 more)

Broader Connections

• Environmental standard-setting is institutionally unsuited to the legislative arena #corroborates (0.85) — Richard J. Lazarus, The Making of Environmental Law, 838
• Federalist Society federalism opposes the deliberately national structure of pollution statutes #expands (0.78) — Richard J. Lazarus, The Making of Environmental Law, 538