The successful launch of the Soviet Union's first two satellites prompted U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower
and Congress to put aside their differences and create a lasting national space policy and the institution tasked with carrying it out.
On July 29,
1958, Eisenhower signed the National
Aeronautics and Space Act, officially establishing NASA.
Before
its creation, the United States did not have a space
program per se, according to Eilene Galloway, who helped draft the NASA charter and
now serves as honorary director of the International Institute of Space Law. However, separate programs did exist within the U.S.
military services, including the Navy's Vanguard, the
Air Force's Man in Space Program, and the Army's Jupiter and Juno programs,
said Ted Spitzmiller, a space historian and author of "Astronautics: Book 1: Dawn of the
Space Age."
But the
launch of the two Sputnik spacecraft in October and
November 1957 catalyzed the decision to implement a broader mandate for space
activities and programs, Spitzmiller said in a July 16 telephone interview.
The first
Sputnik launch was a day Galloway remembers vividly. "Everybody became
absolutely terrified," she said in a July 22 interview. "It brought
the whole world together in fear."
Galloway, then a national defense
analyst with no experience in space matters, was called on to analyze the
threat from Soviet ICBMs.
In November 1957, Senate Majority Leader Lyndon Johnson (D-Texas), chairman of the Senate Armed Services preparedness subcommittee, held
hearings on the perceived threat of Soviet ICBMs. Galloway was responsible for analyzing the expert testimonies.
Since the
Soviets orbited a satellite before the United States, Johnson felt Eisenhower was allowing U.S. missile technology to slip
behind, Spitzmiller said. However, Eisenhower did not believe the Soviets
possessed superior missile technology and was determined to keep the public's
focus on space
as a civil effort, Spitzmiller said. Eisenhower did not want to enter a
space race with the Soviets and likely would not have made NASA a top level priority because he considered much of it a waste of resources.
But Eisenhower did not successfully
communicate his position to the public, and thus
was attacked by the Democrats — especially by Johnson, Spitzmiller said.
To the credit of both men, Eisenhower and Johnson found common
ground to establish NASA — the senator softened his
militaristic stance on space and the president agreed to back an overarching
national space organization , Spitzmiller said.
The
testimonies of scientists and engineers during the subcommittee hearings changed
Johnson's perception of space as a battlefield to one
wrought with scientific and commercial opportunities, Galloway said. Some scientists spoke of the Sputnik
satellites as part of a peaceful effort the International Geophysical Year,
she said.
Meanwhile, the president's science advisor, James Killian,
helped Eisenhower see the need for a larger, more
authoritative space infrastructure, Spitzmiller said.
Johnson's hearings were completed in
January 1958, and later that month the U.S. government decided to
create a civil space agency, Spitzmiller said.
The
National Aeronautics and Space Act was completed within nine months of Sputnik
2's launch, Galloway said.
Galloway
made sure House Speaker John McCormack (D-Mass.) changed the last
part of NASA's name from "agency" to "administration," because as an administration, NASA has broader
authority to gather resources from other government bodies without relying on
voluntary cooperation, she said.
NASA officially began
operating Oct. 1, 1958, using the civilian National Advisory Committee for
Aeronautics staff and research facilities as its backbone. Other space research facilities, such
as the Army's Ballistic Missile Agency
in Huntsville, Ala., were integrated into the new space agency as well.
The act transferred authority for military space to the Defense Department, and the Advanced Research Projects Agency was created in February 1958 to head
military space research.
NASA's
creation was a result of quick, bipartisan cooperation
between the Republican president and the Democrat-controlled Congress, Galloway
said. That kind of cooperation was shown again when Eisenhower sent Johnson to the United Nations in November 1958
to facilitate an international space policy agreement, she said.
After amending the policy to include a
consensus format to appease the Soviet Union, Czechoslovakia and
Poland, the Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space was established in 1959, Galloway said.
The U.S.
effort to establish a national space policy, as well as international rules and guidelines
for space conduct, was the "beginning of
space law," Galloway said.
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