Clean Politics, Clean Streams: A Legislative Autobiography and Reflections - Softcover

Kury, Franklin L.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1611461049 ISBN 13: 9781611461046

Publisher: Lehigh University Press, 2011

Synopsis

In this legislative autobiography Franklin L. Kury tells the story about his election to the Pennsylvania House of Representatives, and later the Senate, against the senior Republican in the House and an entrenched patronage organization. The only Democrat elected from his district to serve in the House or Senate since the Roosevelt landslide in 1936, Kury was instrumental in enacting the environmental amendment to the state constitution, a comprehensive clean streams law, the gubernatorial disability law, reform of the Senate's procedure for confirmation of gubernatorial appointments, a new public utility law, and flood plain and storm water management laws. The story told here is based on Kury's recollections of his experience, supplemented by his personal files, extensive research in the legislative archives, and conversations with persons knowledgeable on the issues. This book is well documented with notes and appendices of significant documents. Several chapters provide detailed "inside" descriptions of how campaigns succeeded and the enactment of legislation happened. The passage of the environmental amendment, clean streams law, public utility code, flood plain and storm water management laws, and the gubernatorial disability law are recounted in a manner that reveals what it takes to pass such proposals. The book concludes with the author's reflections on the legislature's historical legacies, its present operation, and its future.

About this title

About the Author

Franklin L. Kury served six years in the Pennsylvania House of Representatives and eight years in the Pennsylvania State Senate. He was a leader in environmental and government reform legislation. His first book, Clean Politics, Clean Streams, was cited by name and used by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court in the landmark environmental law decision in the Robinson Township case in 2013. Visit the author's website at www.franklinkury.com.

Edition details

• Publisher: Lehigh University Press
• Publication date: 2011
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1611461049
• ISBN 13: 9781611461046
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 292