Why Vote?

Sierra, Sept, 2000 by Carl Pope, Paul Rauber

This November all three branches of government are up for grabs.

We could win this time.

Here it is, the bright new millennium, but many environmentalists are sunk in gloom. Even though the Democratic presidential nominee is famous eco-wonk Al Gore, author of the (newly reissued) call to action Earth in the Balance and chief lobbyist for environmental issues in the Clinton White House, many green voters are in a sulk, recalling every dashed hope and disappointment of the last eight years. * Some are lured by the call of the Green Party candidate, legendary consumer advocate Ralph Nader, who promises to out-green Gore. Many of Nader's positions, after all, directly mirror those of the Sierra Club. For example, says Nader, "I don't believe there should be any logging in the federal forests, period." He speaks out against corporate power, for strong automobile fuel-economy standards, and promises that he wouldn't sign any international trade agreements without strong protections for labor and the environment. * Sounds great. One small problem: no one--least of all Nader--thinks he's going to get elected. His campaign would be a success, he says, if he wins 5 percent of the popular vote, which would qualify the Green Party for $5 million in federal matching funds, making it better able to compete in 2004. Polls show Nader hovering near that 5 percent figure, winning as much as 10 percent in some western states. According to pollster John Zogby, two out of three voters who are likely to vote for Nader would otherwise vote for Gore. (The other third probably wouldn't vote at all.)

That's good news for the Green Party, but bad news for the environment. Because even should he fall short of 5 percent, if Nader takes enough votes away from Gore in a few closely contested states, it's hail to the chief, George W. Bush.

If environmental voters throw the election to Bush, they will be casting away the opportunity of a lifetime. This November, the electoral planets have aligned themselves so as to make major change possible, with all three branches of government in play as they have not been since 1952.

Despite the symbolic importance of the presidency, it is only one-third of our government structure. Even a President Nader, faced with a recalcitrant Congress and querulous Supreme Court, would find it impossible to implement his environmental dreams. But a shift of as few as a dozen seats could rid us of the anti-environmental Republican leadership in the House and Senate. With a new leadership that would work with environmentalists of both parties, Congress could once again pass desperately needed landmark legislation. And with a sympathetic president and Congress, we might finally get some environmental advocates on the Supreme Court. Sierra Club members could play an important role in making it happen--or not.

When power is divided, as it has been since 1994, the checks and balances of government make for legislative stalemate. President Clinton, for example, was able to veto or block the worst anti-environmental excesses of recent congresses, but visionary proposals remained bogged down in hostile committees. Clinton and Gore have often been criticized by environmentalists who complain that they didn't accomplish more. But faced with the most anti-environmental Congress in decades, the only way they could have implemented their good intentions would have been by mimicking Boris Yeltsin, abolishing Congress, and ruling by decree. Absent a Green Czar who would ban clearcutting, internal combustion, and baconburgers by fiat, change will come at its customary incremental pace.

This year, however, given the narrow balance of power in Congress, the possibilities for change are far greater than usual. A green president working with a greener Congress could, for example, move on long-delayed wilderness designations, end commercial logging in the national forests, bring down antiquated dams before historic salmon runs go extinct, stop the production of deadly dioxins, and slow the sprawl of our cities (see "Thinking Big," January/February). It wouldn't all happen at once, but at least we could finally see what progress looked like.

The next president and Congress will also determine the future direction of the Supreme Court. At present, the court is divided between conservatives and moderates. (There hasn't been an environmental champion on the bench since William O. Douglas stepped down in 1975.) Three of the nine justices are now over 70, two of them in ill health. The next president will stamp the legal future for a generation, making as many as four high-court appointments. If Bush wins, Chief Justice William Rehnquist is likely to retire, leaving Justice Antonin Scalia--the most anti-environmental voice on the court--likely to fill his shoes. On the other hand, should Gore win, Scalia has hinted that he may step down from the bench and return to private life.

The prospect of a Bush presidency and a Scalia Supreme Court doesn't bother Ralph Nader, who purports to see little practical difference between Gore and Bush. Both parties, he says, "are so marinated in big-business money they can't be internally reformed." A Bush presidency, Nader says, would be a salutary "cold shower" for the Democratic Party. The implication is that it would either force the Democratic Party to the left or precipitate its decline and fall, whereupon it would be superseded by the insurgent Greens.