Father of PA Constitution’s environmental rights amendment dies at 89
Reprinted from the PA Environmental Digest Blog
On August 16, 2026, former state Sen. Franklin L. Kury, author of the Environmental Rights Amendment to the Pennsylvania Constitution, passed away at the age of 89. The amendment guarantees the people of Pennsylvania the right to clean air, pure water and preservation of natural, scenic and historic sites.
Elected to the House of Representatives for three terms (1966–1972) and to the state Senate in 1972 for two terms representing Northumberland, Columbia, Juniata, Montour, Snyder and Union counties, Franklin Kury was a leader in the enactment of environmental laws, such as amendments to the Clean Streams Act, that are seen as the culmination of the environmental revolution that marked the end of the exploitation of the state’s natural resources by the coal, steel and railroad industries.
He was the author and lead advocate for the Environmental Rights Amendment to the state constitution that declares–
“The people have a right to clean air, pure water, and to the preservation of the natural, scenic, historic and esthetic values of the environment. Pennsylvania’s public natural resources are the common property of all the people, including generations yet to come. As trustee of these resources, the Commonwealth shall conserve and maintain them for the benefit of all the people.”
On May 18, 1971, the people of Pennsylvania voted 1,021,342 to 259,979– a 4 to 1 margin– to add this right to the state constitution alongside the rights to religious freedom, freedom of press and speech, political powers, right to elections, security from search and seizures, and the “inherent rights of mankind”
Kury was proud of the fact the Women’s Equal Rights Amendment on the same ballot passed by a 2 to 1 margin.
In the state Senate, he led a six-year struggle that resulted in the enactment of the state’s floodplain and stormwater management laws and helped modernize the Public Utility Commission in addition to the Environmental Rights Amendment.
In 2011, he authored an autobiography– Clean Politics, Clean Streams: A Legislative Autobiography– published by the Lehigh University Press.
PA Supreme Court decisions in December 2013 — Robinson Township v. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania– and in June 2017– Pennsylvania Environmental Defense Foundation v. Commonwealth– brought the Environmental Rights Amendment to life.
The Court looked at the plain language of the Amendment and said it placed a duty on the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the General Assembly, Governor and each state agency and local government to conserve Pennsylvania’s natural resources, as a trustee preserves a trust for the beneficiaries of the trust.
“It held that the text of Article I, Section 27 provides the rules to be applied in any case,” said John Dernbach, Emeritus Professor of Law at Widener University. “It also reaffirmed that the constitutional public trust is self-executing; it does not need further legislation in order to be applied.” [Read more here.]
Reacting to the 2013 decision, Kury told PA Environment Digest– “The opinion as it relates to Article I, Section 27 is everything I hoped it would be. It took everything we did then and set a new standard for precedent. Environmental laws and actions will now have to be judged against the Amendment.”
In 2021, Kury celebrated the 50th anniversary of the enactment of the Environmental Rights Amendment by authoring– In The Constitutional Question To Save The Planet: The Peoples’ Right To A Healthy Environment– proposing a U.S. constitutional amendment on environmental rights.
Former Gov. Tom Ridge said of the book– “Franklin Kury has given us the intriguing inside story of an important Pennsylvania le¬gal policy, and social development—the “Environmental Amendment” to our Constitution. . . . It will give scholars, historians, policymakers, and citizens alike important in-sights and good guidance for the next 50 years. For this book, and for his decades of wise environmental leadership and respected political activism, Frank deserves our thanks.”
The PA Environment Digest Blog is a daily and weekly blog covering environmental issues statewide, edited by David E. Hess, former secretary of the Department of Environmental Protection from 2001 to 2003. Subscribe at bottom of blog.
PHOTO/Courtesy of Kury family
