DDT Wars: Rescuing Our National Bird, Preventing Cancer, And
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DDT Wars DDT Wars Rescuing Our National Bird, Preventing Cancer, and Creating the Environmental Defense Fund CHARLES F. WURSTER 1 1 Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide. Oxford New York Auckland Cape Town Dar es Salaam Hong Kong Karachi Kuala Lumpur Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Nairobi New Delhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto With offices in Argentina Austria Brazil Chile Czech Republic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore South Korea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and certain other countries. Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press 198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016 © Charles F. Wurster 2015 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, by license, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reproduction rights organization. Inquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above. You must not circulate this work in any other form and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Wurster, Charles F. DDT wars : rescuing our national bird, preventing cancer, and creating the Environmental Defense Fund / Charles F. Wurster. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978–0–19–021941–3 (alk. paper) 1. DDT (Insecticide)—Toxicology. 2. DDT (Insecticide)—Physiological effect. 3. DDT (Insecticide)—Environmental aspects. 4. Environmental Defense Fund. 5. Health promotion. 6. Environmental health. I. Title. SB952.D2W87 2015 632’.9517—dc23 2014042820 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper 9780190219413-Wurster.indb 4 05/03/15 4:43 PM Dedicated to Lorrie Otto, who did her best to protect life on Earth, to William D. Ruckelshaus, a public servant who did the right thing, to Marion Lane Rogers who kept this history alive and inspired us all, and to Marie H. Gladwish, who more than anyone else, with endless encouragement, affection and her many talents, helped bring this book to fruition. CONTENTS Preface xi Foreword xv Acknowledgments xix 1. A New England Town Sprays Its Elm Trees with DDT 1 How Did I Get into This? 2 DDT Kills Birds but Doesn’t Save the Trees 7 2. Sue the Bastards on Long Island: The Power of an Idea 13 DDT Goes to Trial on Long Island 18 Rigging the Audubon Convention; A Wall Street Lawyer Was Unimpressed 23 The Environmental Defense Fund Is Born 25 3. Proceed with Caution, then Sue the Bastards in Michigan 29 The Suit Partly Unravels; Another Win While Losing 33 The Cities Cave In, Forget to Kick Us Out 33 Evolving a Master Plan 34 4. On to Wisconsin, the Dairy State 37 DDT Goes to Trial in Madison, Wisconsin 40 Birds Die, Nests Fail 45 DDT, Thin Eggshells, and Reduced Reproduction in Birds 49 DDT Reduces Reproduction in Trout and Salmon 57 Wayland Hayes: “DDT Is Absolutely Safe” 59 A Toxicologist Arrives from Sweden 60 The Task Force for DDT Questions the Analyses; Confusion with PCBs 61 Integrated Pest Management Without any DDT 63 viii CONTENTS Summation: DDT Is a Pollutant in the Wisconsin Ecosystem 65 To Make an Omelet, You will Break Some Eggs 66 Mid-1969: Where Did We Stand, What Had We Accomplished? 69 Final Verdict from the DDT Hearings in Wisconsin 70 5. EDF, Barely an Organization, Getting Its Act Together 73 Environmental Defense Fund, or Fundless Environmental Defenders? 78 6. EDF Diversifies into New Environmental Arenas 87 Early Battles 88 The Environmental Decade: The 1970s 93 Environmental Defense Fund: Biggest Bang for the Buck 99 The Judicial Approach Is Contagious 100 7. Time to Go After the Feds 103 What!? DDT Also Causes Cancer? 106 What!? DDT Also Causes Mutations and Birth Defects? 108 Both Federal Agencies React to the Petitions. Barely! 108 The Environmental Defense Fund Takes Two Federal Agencies to Court 110 The Appeals Court Makes an Historic Decision 111 The Bruising Battle of the Briefs 113 8. Escalating the DDT Issue with More Court Cases 115 Flushing Tons of DDT into the Los Angeles Sewer System 116 What Happened to Montrose and Its Pollution Legacy After 1972? 117 Bald Eagles Gone, Golden Eagles Move in 119 9. Changes in Washington Affect the DDT Battle 123 EDF Begins to Expand: New People, New Washington Office 127 CONTENTS ix 10. DDT Goes to Trial, Finally, in Washington, DC 131 DDT: Global Contamination Problem 136 Predatory Birds Pay the Price 138 Mechanism for DDE-Induced Thin-Shelled Eggs 143 Dangers of DDT to Fish and People Who Eat Them 145 Superior Insect Control Without DDT 145 Does DDT Cause Cancer? In Mice? Rats? Humans? 148 DDT Industry Shortage of Qualified Witnesses 151 11. Ruckelshaus Decides 157 The Ruckelshaus Decision: DDT Gets Canceled! Almost! 158 Both Sides Appeal the Ruling to the Court of Appeals 163 Passing the Test of Time 163 They Are After Us Again—40 Years Later. Why? 164 The Use of DDT for Controlling Malaria 168 12. Encores: Five More Bad Actors Were Dispatched 171 Aldrin and Dieldrin on Trial: Suspension Mid-stream 172 Heptachlor/Chlordane: Another Suspension Mid-stream 178 Mirex Will “Eradicate” the Imported Fire Ant 180 13. The DDT Wars: Four Great Victories 183 DDT Ban Led to Greater Cancer Prevention 184 DDT Precedents Launched Environmental Law 186 Remove the Threat and the Birds Will Recover 188 EDF Today: Brilliant, Innovative, Optimistic, and Effective 195 Epilogue: The Last Word by President Fred Krupp 201 Appendices 205 Bibliography 209 Index 215 PREFACE The Bald Eagle, our national bird, engraved on the Great Seal of the United States of America, was disappearing from America. Predatory birds of many species were in sharp decline. Brown Pelicans in California laid eggs that broke and produced almost no chicks. Mother’s milk was so contami- nated that if it were in any other container, it could not legally cross state lines. Humans worldwide were contaminated, as were penguins in Ant- arctica and polar bears in the Arctic. Laboratory tests indicated that the insecticide DDT caused cancer. William Ruckelshaus, first administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), banned DDT in 1972. Told by someone who lived it, this book details how a modest group of volunteer scientists and citizens fought the “DDT wars” from Long Island living rooms through the courts to ultimate victory. This was overwhelm- ingly a grassroots effort. They were not revolutionaries, did not demon- strate in the streets, threatened nobody, and hugged no trees; nobody lay down in front of a bulldozer. They had neither wealth nor political con- nections. What they did have were determination, passion, and persist- ence to eliminate the DDT threat. They got the science right. This dedicated group of scientists, citizens, and a few attorneys esca- lated the DDT issue from local to state to national prominence. They used our democratic, legal, and political systems designed for the peaceful reso- lution of disputes. Experts from varying disciplines from around the coun- try and the world rallied to the cause. Margaret Mead said, “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that has.” That is exactly what happened here. xii PREFACE Along the way a new organization, the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), was created, without funds, by 10 citizens, the same volunteers who pursued the DDT campaign. Their strategy was to take environmen- tal problems to court using scientific evidence. Significant legal obstacles challenged the campaign from the beginning. The team was repeatedly thrown out of court. Rachel Carson’s groundbreaking book Silent Spring aroused public opinion, caused substantial alarm, and was vigorously denounced by the chemical industry. Her analysis of the scientific literature was accurate, but Silent Spring did not immediately change government pesticide poli- cies. EDF, through a systematic and persistent campaign employing sci- entific evidence through legal channels, did change government pesticide policies. By chance and circumstances, I found myself in the midst of this course of events beginning in 1963. I was told I should write a book about it, but why write a book 40 years after the fact? Why now? When it seemed timely and sensible 40 years ago, when the whole story was fresh in my mind and all the relevant papers surrounded me, I retreated from the task. Many other things needed to be done, and the job was intimidat- ing. Somebody else would write this book. Furthermore, the goal had been to get DDT banned, and that had been accomplished. The fledgling organization EDF still needed nurturing and attention; so did my full- time, paying faculty position at the State University of New York at Stony Brook. The DDT battles paid nothing. If anything, they were a detriment to my career. Writing a book just did not fit in at that time. During the past decade my thinking began to change. “Somebody else” had not written this book. An accurate account of the DDT saga did not exist. Distortions began to appear. The Internet contained all sorts of false non- sense about why and how DDT got banned. A TV documentary on the Bald Eagle stated that “Congress” had banned DDT.