Who Owns America

Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, Inc, [1971]. Presumed First Edition/First Printing. Hardcover. Good/fair. 22 cm, xii, [2], 328 pages. Occasional footnotes. DJ somewhat soiled and faded, some soiling to fore-edge, sticker residue on DJ flap. Signed by the author. Walter Joseph "Wally" Hickel (August 18, 1919 - May 7, 2010) was an American businessman and politician. Starting out in Alaska during territorial days as a construction worker and subsequently a construction company owner/operator, he later became heavily involved with real estate development during Alaska's post-World War II boom period, building residential subdivisions at first, then branching out to building and operating shopping centers and hotels. Thrust into politics during the early 1950s by a power struggle within the territorial Republican Party and the battle to achieve statehood for Alaska, Hickel remained a formidable power in Alaskan politics for nearly a half century. Hickel served as the second and eighth Governor of Alaska. Defeating incumbent and first governor William A. Egan in 1966, he served as governor until 1969, ending with his resignation upon his confirmation in the position of United States Secretary of the Interior in the cabinet of President Richard Nixon. He later served a full term as governor from 1990 to 1994 under the banner of the Alaskan Independence Party, thus far the party's most significant electoral achievement. The author served as Interior Secretary under Richard Nixon, and was fired after 22 months in office. Excerpts from KIRKUS REVIEW: Walter Hickel's political memoir will doubtless achieve an instant readership, particularly among misty liberals who belatedly adopted him as he championed endangered species. Hickel's a restless, self-made, emotional man whose real feelings are never far from the surface and when his initial disenchantment as a member of the Nixon team grew into festering dissatisfaction, the pent-up frustrations blew all over page one, most of it coming out in the Mike Wallace interviews on ""60 Minutes,"" and recriminatory White House backgrounders. What gives Hickel's account more than transitory value, however, is the firsthand review of his vigorous efforts for a better environment, both as Interior Secretary and Governor of Alaska. His achievements are remarkable: the ""absolute liability"" concept as applied to oil industry pollution, the historic Chevron fire case, the ""Parks to the People"" program, etc. Much of Hickel's success, as recorded here, was due in large part to this administrative style -- he bullied and inspired sluggish bureaucrats into action, tried to and sometimes did cut through layers of governmental red tape, and refused to engage in technocratic jargon. In the final section, Hickel discusses his philosophy of government and our fundamental political problems, asking who owns America and answering we all do, so let's keep it clean and livable and ""Dream big dreams"" and make our public decisions in public in the public interest, which is sincere rhetoric but rhetoric all the same. On balance, this is a tendentious overview of one man's energetic if abbreviated career in public service and it is worth its weight in the rewards and pitfalls.