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International Socialist Review, Fall 1958

 

Common Sewer

 

From International Socialist Review, Vol.19 No.4, Fall 1958, p.143.
Transcription & mark-up by Einde O’Callaghan for ETOL.

 

IS America’s fresh air about to go the way of its forests, virgin land, clear streams, minerals and fossil fuels?

The National Institute of Municipal Law officers thinks so. On March 17, according to United Press, it warned that the nation was “fast dissipating” one of its major natural resources – fresh air.

Jack M. Merelman, Institute lawyer, told a House Commerce subcommittee that “the very air we breathe is being used as a common sewer where fumes, gases and all manner of pollutants are dumped.

Merelman blamed automobile exhaust for air pollution. He supported a bill to outlaw the use of cars emitting more unburned hydrocarbons than the Public Health Service deemed safe.

Other authorities have pointed to the smoke and fumes from private industry as the main source of the poisonous smog that makes breathing difficult in many of America’s cities.

Then there are the nuclear tests.

 
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