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majority or failed as a party of wholesale opposition. Reagangave the party a new positive definition, and that newdefinition became the basis of a revitalized party and theeventual Republican control of the Congress and the pres-idency. The 1994 congressional victories would not havebeen possible without Reagan, anymore than the Demo-cratic or Republican Parties could have come into beingin the nineteenth century without the leadership of AndrewJackson and Abraham Lincoln. Parties have never beencreated from the bottom up in American politics; theyhave formed around presidential candidates.Korzi neglects this fact in part because he accepts adistorted view of the Founders’ Constitution. Korzi fol-lows conventional scholarly opinion in arguing that theFounders’ system eschewed popular presidential leader-ship in favor of elevated statesmanship. But like so manyother scholars, Korzi relies almost exclusiv ely on Hamilton’saccount of the presidency and the presidential selectionsystem in The Federalist. Hamilton did represent one strainof thought on presidential leadership at the Constitu-tional Convention, but he had little influence on thedebates over presidential selection and was, in fact, absentfor a good deal of the convention. It was James Wilsonand Gouverneur Morris, supporters of popular election,who shaped the selection system, based upon the theorythat the president would represent the people of the nationas a whole. Morris even went so far as to predict thatpolitical parties would inevitably form in support of andin opposition to the president. Neither Hamilton nor Jef-ferson fully appreciated the possibility of a popular, inde-pendent, constitutional presidency, and that in all likelihoodcontributed to the transient character of the Federalistand the Jeffersonian Republican Parties. Jackson and Mar-tin Van Buren did not so much create a new constitutionas recognize the potentials of the old one.Korzi makes a powerful case for the institutionalrestraints of party government, but in the spirit of healthypartisanship, it must be challenged in the name of popu-lar, independent, and constitutional presidential leader-ship. Nonetheless, he has made a major contribution tothis important debate.The Making of Environmental Law. By Richard J. Lazarus.Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004. 312p. $35.00.— Craig W. Thomas, University of Massachusetts, AmherstRichard Lazarus brings rich experience to this book. Inthe 1980s, he ser ved as a litigator in the Environment andNatural Resources Division, and as an assistant to thesolicitor general, in the Department of Justice. He hasrepresented environmental groups and local, state, andfederal governments in numerous cases before the S upremeCourt. Given this extensive legal background, one mightexpect the book to be a dense treatise on environmentallaw. Yet it is written for a much broader audience, with anengaging narrative style that is accessible for those nottrained as lawyers. It is also interdisciplinary, covering every-thing from ecological theory in the opening chapters tothe historical, economic, and political contexts of environ-mental law in the United States. While this interdisciplin-ary effort is admirable, the strength of the book clearly liesin the author’s legal interpretations. Political scientists willbe less impressed with his discussion of topics like publicopinion and interest group behavior. Yet what mattersmore than relatively minor shortcomings with respect toany one discipline is that Lazarus has produced an engag-ing and articulate book that strives to reach a broad audi-ence beyond law schools. For this reason, The Making ofEnvironmental Law would make a wonderful addition toupper-division and masters level environmental policycourses. It is not sufficiently theoretical for most doctoralseminars, but it certainly deserves a central location onthe shelves of environmental policy scholars.Lazarus draws on numerous theories, but does notbuild his work around any one theory. Nor does he testhypotheses in a social scientific way. Rather, he brings apoint of view to environmental law that is informed bytheory. Part I, for example, draws heavily on ecologicaltheory to frame the purpose and challenges of environ-mental law. Chapters 1 and 2 are devoted to the ecolog-ical context of environmental law, while Chapter 3 analyzeshow the U.S. Constitution is inconsistent with principlesfrom ecological theory. These opening chapters providethe theoretical structure for the book, which focuses onthe challenges of developing environmental law that isconsistent with scientific understandings of the environ-ment while operating within the constitutional frame-work. The author’s normative view is also guided byecological theory. Rather than argue, for example, thatmost human impacts on the environment should beimpeded, he argues that “ecological transformation is bothunavoidable and very often desirable” (p. 1). Strict pres-ervationists in the tradition of John Muir, David Brower,and Dave Foreman would likely be discomforted, if notappalled, by this argument. But Lazarus is a pragmatistwho builds his argument from a scientific understandingof dynamic ecosystems, the causal uncertainties associ-ated with understanding ecosystems, and the potentialrisks to humans of transforming ecosystems in par ticularways. Hence, environmental law is not merely a meansto specific ends, such as preserving wilderness or bio-diversity. Instead, environmental law should changewith changing scientific knowledge, while leaning on theprecautionary principle as scientists learn more about howecosystems actually function. This places him in the tra-dition of Aldo Leopold, albeit with a contemporary under-standing of dynamic—rather than static—ecosystems.Lazarus then picks up the historical trail in Part II,with chapters devoted to each of the last four decades ofthe twentieth century. Given that he begins in the 1960s,Book Reviews|American Politics906 Perspectives on Politicshe primarily focuses on the development of pollutionlaws, not resource protection laws. Yet he notes at severalpoints how pollution laws followed from preceding re-source protection laws. For the most part, the four chap-ters in Part II are fairly standard histories of thedevelopment of environmental law since the 1960s, witheach chapter underscored by the author’s faith that envi-ronmental law is becoming increasingly established, evenas the


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