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Polluter Versus Polluter: The Pennsylvania Railroad and the Manufacturing of Pollution Policies in the 1920s

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 October 2011

Nicholas Casner
Nicholas Casner
Affiliation:
Boise State University
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Extract

In 1920 the Pennsylvania Railroad sued several small coal companies over water pollution. The lawsuit, ultimately decided in the railroad's favor, overturned an earlier Pennsylvania court decision that granted a property right to pollute, and, more important, now represents a major transitional period in American water policy history. The period marked the end of water policy generated from court decisions and case law, and the beginning of an era dominated by legislative statute and agency interpretation. With the Pennsylvania case, the impacts of nineteenth-century court decisions that sanctioned pollution to encourage business waned as concern for the nation's public health demanded more expansive attention, and industry itself began to experience excessive costs from corrupted water resources. In Pennsylvania and elsewhere, lawmakers attempted to institute a new strategy for economic interest in harmony with efforts to improve environmental quality.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Policy History , Volume 11 , Issue 2 , April 1999 , pp. 179 - 200
Copyright
Copyright © The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA. 1999

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References

Notes

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31. The delay in court action can only be explained by the high demand for coal and federal control of the industry during World War I.

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