How Should America’s Wilderness be Managed? | Introduction
People have been managing the American wilderness for thousands of years. Early Native Americans burned undergrowth in some forests to benefit hunters. They planted hillsides with medicinal herbs and diverted streams to irrigate corn, beans, and other crops. The natural world was held sacred by this relatively small population, however, and most of the American wilderness remained untouched by human hands.
When millions of people came to America from Europe during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, they brought a different concept of wilderness with them. They believed that the virgin American wilderness offered an endless bounty of useful game animals, trees, coal, gold, oil, and other resources that could be exploited for great wealth.
The idea of managing the wilderness would have been an odd notion in this era. The American wilderness was largely regarded as a commodity; natural resources were to be utilized for the personal gain of a few and the progress of society as a whole. In the process wild animals were hunted to extinction, millions of acres of forests were leveled, and waterways were dammed, drained, or plowed into farm fields. Oil, coal, gold, silver, and a host of other minerals were wrested from the ground. Little regard was given to the natural balance of the ecosystems that produced these resources.
By the early twentieth century, attitudes were beginning to change. The wholesale slaughter of the buffalo had reduced the once mighty herd from tens of millions to about four hundred. The eastern hardwood forests had fallen, many species of birds were tottering on the edge of extinction, and vast tracts of wild California had been destroyed by gold hunters.
The idea of setting aside wilderness areas for conservation and public enjoyment began in 1864 when Congress donated Yosemite Valley to the state of California for preservation as a park. Eight years later, Congress set aside the Yellowstone area of Wyoming and Montana as a public park for the benefit of all Americans. Other national parks were soon added, including Sequoia in California, Mount Rainier in Washington, Crater Lake in Oregon, and Glacier in Montana. The idealistic impulse to preserve nature was often joined by the desire to make money. For example, western railroads lobbied for many of the early parks to boost their tourist business. These companies also built grand rustic hotels in the parks—often in environmentally sensitive areas. Ever since that time, business interests and wilderness management have been joined together—sometimes to the advantage of both, sometimes in conflict with one another.
Today, America’s fifty-four national parks remain largely untouched by loggers, ranchers, miners, and others. About half of the acreage in the parks is designated as wilderness. In these areas all industrial activity is banned, motorized vehicles are prohibited, and a limited number of over- night hikers are allowed to visit each week. These areas are managed to meet the requirements of the Wilderness Act, passed by Congress in 1964, which reads:
A wilderness, in contrast with those areas where man and his own works dominate the landscape, is hereby recognized as an area where the earth and its community of life are untrammeled by man, where man himself is a visitor who does not remain. An . . . area of undeveloped Federal land retaining its primeval character and influence, without permanent improvements or human habitation, which is protected and managed so as to preserve its natural conditions.
There are 663 areas in the United States designated as wilderness by the government—about 35 million acres total. These areas include portions of the national parks as well as other regions deemed sensitive. They are managed by the National Park Service, the U.S. Forest Service, and other federal agencies. While these areas are protected, there is controversy over their management. Some areas are being “loved to death”; that is, they are flooded with crowds of visitors who create traffic jams on nearby roads, disturb wildlife, and leave behind tons of garbage. Some areas are also threatened by nearby development, where logging, oil exploration, air pollution, homebuilding, and off-road vehicle use threatens the character of the wilderness.
Perhaps the greatest conflict in land management is over wild areas that do not have official federal wilderness protection. These wilderness areas are managed by a host of agencies including the National Forest Service, the Bureau of Land Management, the Fish and Wildlife Service, and others. The Forest Service controls the largest amount of territory, managing 191 million acres of national forestland in the United States—8.5 percent of the country’s landmass. About 95 million acres remain roadless. These areas are subject to the agency’s congressional mandate that directs the service to manage forests for multiple uses, including timber, gas and oil exploration, recreation, and wildlife.
Like most other issues involving the government in recent years, the actions of the Forest Service and other agencies are highly politicized. Land management issues are especially divisive as decisions made by government workers affect the livelihoods of fishermen, ranchers, loggers, oil and gas workers, and those in the tourist industry.
There are also heated battles among citizens who utilize national forests for fun. Hikers, backpackers, skiers, horseback riders, canoe paddlers, and environmentalists want to enjoy unspoiled areas where they can find peace, solace, and relaxation. Those who ride motorcycles, snowmobiles, all-terrain, and other off-road vehicles want to roar through the wilderness testing their driving skills and the endurance of their machines.
With so many people competing for a shrinking wilderness, conflicts over management of these areas are rarely settled for long. No sooner does the government designate an area as wilderness than industry groups and land owners initiate lawsuits challenging the wilderness designation. Conversely, when the Forest Service opens an area to logging, drilling, or mining, environmentalists sue to stop the projects.
These issues are also affected by politics. Land management issues can change overnight when one political party takes over from another. For example, when Democrat Bill Clinton was president, he had the backing of many national environmental organizations. Clinton set aside huge areas of wilderness for protection from the destructive effects of road building. When Republican George W. Bush replaced Clinton in 2000, he began reversing the roadless rules. Critics claimed Bush was simply attempting to please his political donors in the oil, gas, and logging businesses.
Politics also affect the culture of the federal agencies that manage the wilderness. Clinton appointed a renowned environmentalist, Bruce Babbitt, to head the Department of the Interior, which oversees the Forest Service, the Park Service, and other agencies. During Babbitt’s tenure, the Department of Interior enacted greater protective measures for old-growth forests, endangered species, and wilderness areas while focusing less on the rights of miners, ranchers, loggers, and landowners to use those areas.
Babbitt’s policies were set aside in 2001 when Bush placed Gale Norton at the head of the Interior Department. Norton spent most of her career at the Denver-based Mountain States Legal Foundation, a conservative think tank that opposes the government’s role in environmental protection. Under Norton’s direction, the Department of Interior took the opposite approach of Babbitt’s, weakening wilderness protections and opening formerly protected areas to gas and oil development, mining, logging, and other uses.
Those shifts in policy reveal fundamentally opposing views of the environment. While some want to preserve America’s wildlands in their natural state for perpetuity, others want to use the natural resources abundant in the wilderness. This conflict is reflected in the arguments put forth in the following pages. Throughout At Issue: How Should America’s Wilderness Be Managed? authors present differing views on the stewardship of America’s wildest places.
