ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the early history of ecology and environmental law. From the viewpoint of the modem environmentalist, the history of the United States in the nineteenth century represents a challenge to everything the modem environmental movement stands for. The public policy and law of this age fostered this challenge. Public culture quickly accepted the primacy of the market, with its consequent commodification of property, an exaggerated respect for wealth, and the accordance to it of political power. George Perkins Marsh is the first major figure who established the connection between an ecological vision and "environmental regulation". Ecological information, as one of the many materials of science, is used within the legislative, administrative, and judicial processes of environmental law. Regulation and protection of the environment are pursued through the intricacies of federal and state administrative law, in which administrative agencies issue regulations and permits that govern potential offenders.
