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The League of Conservation Voters (LCV) is an American
environmental A biophysical environment is a biotic and abiotic surrounding of an organism or population, and consequently includes the factors that have an influence in their survival, development, and evolution. A biophysical environment can vary in scale f ...
advocacy group. LCV says that it "advocates for sound environmental laws and policies, holds elected officials accountable for their votes and actions, and elects pro-environment candidates." The organization pursues its goals through voter education, voter mobilization, and direct contributions to political candidates. LCV includes 29 state affiliates. LCV was founded in 1970 by
environmentalist An environmentalist is a person who is concerned with and/or advocates for the protection of the environment. An environmentalist can be considered a supporter of the goals of the environmental movement, "a political and ethical movement that s ...
Marion Edey, with support from
David Brower David Ross Brower (; July 1, 1912 – November 5, 2000) was a prominent environmentalist and the founder of many environmental organizations, including the John Muir Institute for Environmental Studies (1997), Friends of the Earth (1969), Eart ...
. "An article by Reuters on May 20 about the resignation of David Brower from the board of the Sierra Club referred incorrectly to his association with the League of Conservation Voters. Mr. Brower was an adviser to the league; its founder was Marion Edey." The group's current president is Gene Karpinski. It is headquartered in
Washington, D.C. ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, Na ...
, and has over two million members.


History

The League of Conservation Voters was founded by Marion Edey, then a young congressional staffer, who proposed a non-partisan, national pressure group for environmentalists "analogous to a political party" but endorsing Democrats and Republicans in a 1969 letter to David Brower, soon after he resigned from the
Sierra Club The Sierra Club is an environmental organization with chapters in all 50 United States, Washington D.C., and Puerto Rico. The club was founded on May 28, 1892, in San Francisco, California, by Scottish-American preservationist John Muir, who be ...
. Brower strongly endorsed Edey's idea and came up with the name League of Conservation Voters, insisting that Edey run the new organization. The plan to form LCV as an arm of Brower's new environmental organization,
Friends of the Earth Friends of the Earth International (FoEI) is an international network of environmental organizations in 73 countries. The organization was founded in 1969 in San Francisco by David Brower, Donald Aitken and Gary Soucie after Brower's split with ...
, was announced in September 1969. However, as it would have violated the
Federal Corrupt Practices Act The Federal Corrupt Practices Act, also known as the Publicity Act, was a federal law of the United States that was enacted in 1910 and amended in 1911 and 1925. It remained the nation's primary law regulating campaign finance in federal elections ...
for LCV to be a subsidiary of a non-profit corporation like Friends of the Earth, Edey launched the organization as an independent political committee in 1970. She had early success particularly by publishing voting charts of how Members of Congress sided on critical votes. Her first employee in 1971 was James H. Rathlesberger, who Edey hired to raise environmental issues in the 1972 presidential election. Rathlesberger coordinated production of LCV’s profiles on the major candidates and edited “Nixon and the Environment” (1972), Village Voice Books. Both projects received widespread press coverage and contributed to Jimmy Carter’s election in 1976 partly on an environmental platform.


Activities

The organization's main activities include voter education, voter mobilization, tracking voting records, endorsing or opposing candidates for political office, and financially contributing to political campaigns. The related League of Conservation Voters Action Fund (LCVAF) financially supports political candidates, most of whom are members of the Democratic Party. According to OpenSecrets, LCVAF was the top-spending, non-disclosing liberal group in the 2012 election cycle, investing about $11 million in political advertisements. LCV spent a total of $36 million in 2012. LCV annually names a "Dirty Dozen", a list of politicians whom the group aims to defeat because of their voting records on conservation issues. The original "Dirty Dozen" list was developed in partnership with Environmental Action in 1970. LCV strongly opposed many of President
George W. Bush George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is an American politician who served as the 43rd president of the United States from 2001 to 2009. A member of the Republican Party, Bush family, and son of the 41st president George H. W. Bush, he ...
's environmental policies. In 2014, LCV and the Natural Resources Defense Council Action Fund launched LeadingGreen, a joint initiative to address climate change. In 2015, LeadingGreen was added to the
Democracy Alliance The Democracy Alliance is a network of progressive donors who coordinate their political donations to groups that the Alliance has endorsed. It has been described by ''Politico'' as "the country's most powerful liberal donor club". Members of the ...
's funding portfolio. LCV strongly opposed the administration of President
Donald J. Trump Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021. Trump graduated from the Wharton School of the University of ...
and its environmental policies. In September 2018, the pac pledged $60 million to help green candidates. Ultimately, in the mid-term elections of 2018, the pac spent $80 million to support "green" candidates through its Victory Fund. They "had enormous success electing its endorsed candidates in suburban districts last fall," wrote ''The Atlantic'' on January 3, 2019.


National Environmental Scorecard

LCV tracks the voting records of members of Congress on environmental issues in its National Environmental Scorecard, a
legislative scorecard A legislative scorecard, in North American parlance, refers to any ranked balanced scorecard used by advocacy groups to rank sitting legislators or candidates for legislative office on their voting record. It is also used to refer to ranked indexes ...
. The average scores for members of the Democratic Party are historically higher than the scores for members of the Republican Party. According to ''
ThinkProgress ''ThinkProgress'' was an American progressive news website that was active from 2005 to 2019. It was a project of the Center for American Progress Action Fund (CAP Action), a progressive public policy research and advocacy organization. Found ...
'', a very low score on the Scorecard means a member of Congress has not "used their time in Congress to vote with the environment in mind." In 2002,
Kimberley Strassel Kimberley Ann Strassel (born July 24, 1972) is an American conservative columnist and author who is a member of the ''Wall Street Journal'' editorial board. She writes a weekly column, "Potomac Watch", which appears on Fridays. Early life and e ...
of ''
The Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...
'' editorial board wrote that "Democratic politics...is what really drives the league's scorecard." In a 2012 report, the non-profit Rachel's Network examined the Scorecard scores for male and female members of Congress in the 107th through the 111th Congresses (2001 to 2010). The group found that "women in Congress vote for legislation supporting clean air, clean water, renewable energy, climate action, and public health much more often than their male counterparts." The report found that some of the difference was attributable to the fact that there were "more women Democrats in both houses of Congress than there are women Republicans," and Democrats favor more pro-environmental policies, but also found that "the difference in voting patterns still persists when gender is isolated within each political party." The report also found that "the gap between Republican men and women narrowed after the 2004 election cycle, which could be attributable to increased partisan pressures." The Scorecard has been cited by ''
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'', ''
The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large nat ...
'', Bloomberg News, '' U.S. News & World Report'', ''
HuffPost ''HuffPost'' (formerly ''The Huffington Post'' until 2017 and sometimes abbreviated ''HuffPo'') is an American progressive news website, with localized and international editions. The site offers news, satire, blogs, and original content, and ...
'', and ''
Scientific American ''Scientific American'', informally abbreviated ''SciAm'' or sometimes ''SA'', is an American popular science magazine. Many famous scientists, including Albert Einstein and Nikola Tesla, have contributed articles to it. In print since 1845, it i ...
'' magazine. In 1998, scholar Anne Y. Ilinitch and collaborators used the Scorecard "to identify Senators and Representatives with unsupportive environmental voting records" in evaluated corporate political contributions as a measure of corporate environmental performance. In 2004, researchers at the School of Forestry and Wildlife Sciences at
Auburn University Auburn University (AU or Auburn) is a public land-grant research university in Auburn, Alabama. With more than 24,600 undergraduate students and a total enrollment of more than 30,000 with 1,330 faculty members, Auburn is the second largest uni ...
averaged Scorecard scores across a state's congressional delegation as a proxy variable for the "green-ness" of constituents, and found no significant relationship with the number of
Endangered Species Act The Endangered Species Act of 1973 (ESA or "The Act"; 16 U.S.C. § 1531 et seq.) is the primary law in the United States for protecting imperiled species. Designed to protect critically imperiled species from extinction as a "consequence of ec ...
listings in a state. In 2012, Robert Brulle and his collaborators investigated factors affecting U.S. public concern about the threat of climate change and found that "the message sent to the public by the Republican voting record on environmental bills is very influential...This result provides strong confirmation of the role of elite cues and their influence on public concern about climate change. In an extremely partisan environment, Republican votes against environmental bills legitimate public opinion opposed to action on climate change."


Notable donors

Green Tech Action Fund and the Advocacy Fund are among LCV's donors.


See also

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Sustainability Specific definitions of sustainability are difficult to agree on and have varied in the literature and over time. The concept of sustainability can be used to guide decisions at the global, national, and individual levels (e.g. sustainable livin ...
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Ecology Ecology () is the study of the relationships between living organisms, including humans, and their physical environment. Ecology considers organisms at the individual, population, community, ecosystem, and biosphere level. Ecology overlaps w ...


Further reading

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References


External links

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LCV National Environmental Scorecard
* * {{DEFAULTSORT:League Of Conservation Voters Environmental organizations based in Washington, D.C. 527 organizations Organizations established in 1969 Political organizations based in the United States Environmental organizations established in 1969