Senate GOP Leader Hugh Scott assured the President his program would have top priority in the current session. He called the message "no less than a bold and massive stat toward reordering our national attitude and action."
Sen. John Sherman Cooper (R-Ky.) called the Nixon document "a historic message." Expressions of support also came in from the Ford Motor Co. and from the National Institute of Scrap Iron and Steel.
The Nixon program includes new pollution standards for autos and for the gasoline they burn, and a "bounty" for scrapping useless cars.
Other steps include establishment of national air quality standards and provision that violators pay up to $10,000 a day in fines.
While enforcement still would be primarily a state responsibility, Nixon recommended establishment of national emission standards for extremely hazardous pollutants and for selected types of new facilities that might prove major sources of air pollution. The Federal Government would be given authority to go to court to enforce certain standards.
Nixon proposed a 22% increase in spending for new recreational facilities, especially near urban areas, and ordered a survey of lands owned by the Federal Government to determine where new parks could be located.
Nixon proposed adoption of "a new philosophy for the use of federally-owned lands, treating them as a precious resource -- like money itself -- which should be made to serve the highest possible public good."
