Concept

Earth Day

Overview

Earth Day is an annual event on April 22 to demonstrate support for environmental protection. First held on April 22, 1970, it now includes a wide range of events coordinated globally through earthday.org (formerly Earth Day Network) including 1 billion people in more than 193 countries.

In 1969 at a UNESCO conference in San Francisco, the peace activist John McConnell proposed a day to honor the Earth and the concept of peace, to first be observed on March 21, 1970, the first day of spring in the northern hemisphere. This day of nature's equipoise was later sanctioned in a proclamation written by McConnell and signed by Secretary General U Thant at the United Nations. A month later, United States Senator Gaylord Nelson proposed the idea to hold a nationwide environmental teach-in on April 22, 1970, and hired a young activist, Denis Hayes, to be the national coordinator. The name "Earth Day" was coined by the advertising writer Julian Koenig. Hayes and his staff grew the event beyond the original idea for a teach-in to include the entire United States.

Key non-environmentally focused partners played major roles. Under the leadership of the labor leader Walter Reuther, for example, the United Auto Workers (UAW) was the most instrumental outside financial and operational supporter of the first Earth Day. According to Hayes: "Without the UAW, the first Earth Day would have likely flopped!" Nelson was later awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom award in recognition of his work.

The first Earth Day was focused on the United States. In 1990, Denis Hayes, the original national coordinator in 1970, took it international and organized events in 141 nations. On Earth Day 2016, the landmark Paris Agreement was signed by the United States, the United Kingdom, China, and 120 other countries. This signing satisfied a key requirement for the entry into force of the historic draft climate protection treaty adopted by consensus of the 195 nations present at the 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Paris. Numerous communities engaged in "Earth Day Week actions," an entire week of activities focused on the environmental issues that the world faces. On Earth Day 2020, over 100 million people around the world observed the 50th anniversary of the event, now the world's largest civic observance.

Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for authors).

Possible passages

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1. Pythagoras, that the world was formed of five solid figures which are called mathematical; the earth was produced by the cube, the fire by the pyramid, the air by the octahedron, the water by the icosahedron, and the globe of the universe by the dodecahedron. In all these Plato hath the same sentiments with Pythagoras.

   Plutarch, Complete Works of Plutarch — Volume 3

   States what Earth Day is.

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2. It must also here be noted that Augustine's opinion (Gen. ad lit. v, 5) on the production of lights is not at variance with that of other holy writers, since he says that they were made actually, and not merely virtually, for the firmament has not the power of producing lights, as the earth has of producing plants. Wherefore Scripture does not say: "Let the firmament produce lights," though it says: "Let the earth…

   Aquinas Thomas, Summa Theologica, Part I

   States what Earth Day is.

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3. This principle must be unique. The unvarying uniformity of the laws which control the march of the heavenly bodies, the movements of our globe, every species and genus of animal, plant, and mineral, indicates that there is one mover. If there were two, they would either differ, or be opposed to each other, or like each other. If they were different, there would be no harmony; if opposed, things would destroy each…

   Voltaire, Toleration and other essays

   Close in meaning to Earth Day; the term itself is not named.

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Place in the tradition

Part of Environmental ethics.

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