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by Nader 2000
Campaign
Ralph
Nader was born in 1934 in Winsted, CT to Lebanese immigrants Rose and
Nathra Nader. Civic duty had a special meaning in Winsted, the small town
in northwestern Connecticut where Nathra ran the Highland Arms Restaurant
and engaged his customers in spirited debate about public affairs.
Studious, bright and intense, Ralph followed the Yankees, played with
David Halberstam, the future journalist, and read back issues of the
Congressional Record with equal enthusiasm. By age 14 he had read the
early muckrakers--Ida Tarbell, Lincoln Steffens, Upton Sinclair and George
Seldes--who were to inspire his thinking about the distribution of power
in American society and the possibilities of citizenship.
In 1955, he graduated magna cum laude from Princeton, and 1958 from
Harvard Law School. It was at Harvard where Nader first explored an
unorthodox legal topic: the engineering design of automobiles. His
research resulted in an April 1959 article published in The Nation, "The
Safe Car You Can't Buy," in which he declared, "It is clear Detroit today
is designing automobiles for style, cost, performance and calculated
obsolescence, but not--despite the 5,000,000 reported accidents, nearly
40,000 fatalities, 110,000 permanent disabilities and 1,500,000 injuries
yearly--for safety."
In 1963, Nader, then an unknown twenty-nine-year old attorney, abandoned a
conventional law practice in Hartford, Connecticut, and hitchhiked to
Washington, DC, to begin a long odyssey of professional citizenship. "I
had one suitcase," he recalled. "I stayed in the YMCA. Walked across a
little street and had a hot dog, my last." (A few years later he would
expose the repulsive ingredients that go into hot dogs.) He took a job as
a consultant to the US Department of Labor, working for Assistant
Secretary of Labor Daniel Patrick Moynihan. Nader moonlighted as a
freelance writer for The Nation and The Christian Science Monitor. He also
acted as an unpaid adviser to a Senate subcommittee which was exploring
what role the federal government might play in auto safety.
In 1965, he targeted General Motors and the American auto industry in his
best-selling book Unsafe at Any Speed: The Designed-In Dangers of the
American Automobile . When GM attempted to discredit him, he sued them for
invasion of privacy. This landmark case forced the president of GM to go
before a Senate Committee and admit wrongdoing, and a series of safety
laws were passed in 1966 which forced the auto industry to make drastic
design changes for safer motor vehicles. With the money Nader won in the
settlement, he launched the modern consumer movement.
The publicity he received, and the reputation he created for standing up
to predatory corporations, inspired activists from around the nation to go
to Washington, DC to work with Nader. They became known as "Nader’s
Raiders." Organizations were launched to push for laws to protect people
as consumers, workers and taxpayers, and the environment, combating
corporate abuse, and increasing citizen access to government.
Ralph Nader and his Raiders have identified and confronted political and
corporate bosses on hundreds of issues. They have fought against insurance
companies; global trade arrangements that allow other countries to evade
our environment, labor, and consumer protection laws; corporate lobbyists
and politicians who attempt to block safety standards, or to deny fair
access to court for injured parties.
In 1971, Nader founded Public Citizen, to be the consumers’ eyes and ears
in Washington, working for consumer justice and government and corporate
accountability. More than 150,000 people are involved in the six branches
of Public Citizen: Congress Watch, Health Research Group, Litigation
Group, Critical Mass Energy Project, Global Trade Watch and Buyers Up,
which protect Americans from government and corporate power that threatens
our well-being.
Congress Watch protects citizen interests before the US Congress. It works
to strengthen protection of health, safety and the environment; demands an
end to corporate subsidies; ensures citizens’ ability to address corporate
wrongdoing; exposes money’s corruption in politics and advocates for
campaign finance reform.
The Health Research Group works for safe foods, drugs and medical devices.
It fights for consumer control over personal health decisions and
universal access to quality health care. It promotes system-wide changes
in health care policy, and advises and informs and the public about drugs
and medical devices. The HRG has exposed the tobacco industry’s powerful
influence in Washington, the failure of state medical boards to discipline
incompetent doctors, and the excessively high rate of caesarean section
deliveries.
The Litigation Group is the nation’s leading public interest law firm. Its
attorneys bring precedent-setting lawsuits on behalf of citizens to
protect health, safety and rights of consumers.
The Critical Mass Energy Project protects America’s natural resources and
promotes safe, economical, environmentally sound energy use through
conservation and renewable sources. This organization is a watchdog for
nuclear safety issues, and stops the reckless disposal of radioactive
waste.
Global Trade Watch educates the American public about the enormous impact
of international trade and economic globalization on our jobs, the
environment, public health and safety, and democratic accountability. GTW
was created in 1993 to focus on an area few public interest groups
covered: the international commercial agreements shaping the current
version of globalization.
Buyers Up is a home heating oil cooperative group buying program that acts
as an information resource on home energy and environmental issues. Its
reports have yielded important data on the over-promotion of high-octane
gasoline by the oil companies, and the failure of many states to ensure
the quality of gasoline sold to consumers.
Nader’s organizations have been responsible for federal consumer
protection laws such as the Safe Drinking Water Act. They have launched
federal regulatory agencies such as the Occupational Safety and Health
Administration (OSHA), Environment Protection Agency (EPA), and Consumer
Product Safety Administration. They’ve caused the recall of millions of
defective motor vehicles, and created access to the government through the
Freedom of Information Act of 1974.
Ralph Nader has written, co-written or sponsored many books, including
Action for a Change, Corporate Power in America, Taming the Giant
Corporation, Verdicts on Lawyers, The Menace of Atomic Energy, Who’s
Poisoning America, Winning the Insurance Game, The Frugal Shopper. He has
created trust, admiration and respect with his action, integrity, and
commitment to the people.
Other groups he inspired include the Aviation Consumer Action Project,
Center for Auto Safety, Clean Water Action Project, Disability Rights
Center, Pension Rights Center, Freedom of Information Clearinghouse, and
the Congressional Accountability Project. Nader helped establish the
Public Interest Research Groups (PIRGs), the organizations funded and
controlled by students that function on college campuses in 23 states.
Their impact alone has been tremendous. The groups have published hundreds
of ground-breaking reports and guides, lobbied for laws in their state
legislatures, and called the media's attention to environmental and energy
problems.
In November 1980, Nader resigned as director of Public Citizen in order to
devote his energy toward other projects. The organization is now headed by
Joan Claybrook, former head of Congress Watch and the National Highway
Traffic Safety Administration.
Today he lectures on the growing "imperialism" of multinational
corporations and of a dangerous convergence of corporate and government
power. With the passage of autocratic trade treaties like the North
American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and the new General Agreement on
Tariffs and Trade (GATT), the merger of corporate and government interests
is escalating. A magazine founded by Nader in 1980, The Multinational
Monitor, tracks the global intrusion of multinational corporations and
their impact on developing nations, labor, and the environment.
Nader has focused his efforts on empowering citizens to create a
responsive government sensitive to citizens' needs. The top of his agenda
has been defending the US civil justice system. Corporate lobbyists and
certain legislators have worked on both the federal and state levels to
limit consumers' rights to seek justice in court in the areas of product
liability, securities fraud, and medical negligence. Nader recently
co-authored a book on corporate lawyers and the perils of the legal system
entitled No Contest.
The Savings and Loan bailout is also a large concern of his: the
deregulation of the banking industry in the early 1980s led to speculative
real estate deals which taxpayers must now finance. This is one of many
examples of corporate subsidies taxpayers finance through a system Nader
calls "corporate welfare." He is an advocate of insurance reform including
loss-prevention activity and insurance consumer education. He co-authored
the book Winning the Insurance Game, and has been working with consumer
activists in Massachusetts and California on lowering the cost and raising
the coverage of automobile and health insurance in those states.
Nader is un-intimidated by the deregulations posed by the Reagan and Bush
administrations and perpetuated by Clinton. He says, "You've got to keep
the pressure on, even if you lose. The essence of the citizen's movement
is persistence." When asked to define himself, he always responds,
"Full-time citizen, the most important office in America for anyone to
achieve."
Ralph Nader is one of America's most effective social critics. He has been
called Muckraker, Consumer Crusader, and Public Defender. His documented
criticism of government and industry has had widespread effect on public
awareness and bureaucratic power. Time magazine called him "US's toughest
customer." His inspiration and example have awakened consumer advocates,
citizen activists, and public interest lawyers who have established more
public awareness organizations throughout the country.
Nader's original research organization is the Washington, DC based Center
for the Study of Responsive Law. Since 1969, the Center has produced
innumerable reports on wide-ranging subjects such as the Interstate
Commerce Commission, food safety, pensions, corporate welfare, and
government procurement.
His impact on the American political system is tremendous. As former US
Senator James Abourezk observed, "For the first time in US history, a
movement exists whose sole purpose is to keep large corporations and the
government honest."
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