WASHINGTON – President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the national Wilderness Act sixty years ago, marking a major step in the movement to preserve forests, waterways and wildlife from human development.
When Johnson signed the act on Sept. 3, 1964, he launched a system that protects about 110 million acres of federal land today. It was considered a landmark bill then, and it continues to be so over half-a-century later.
The protection of wildlife has a long, contentious history in American politics. President Theodore Roosevelt signed the which designated certain land to remain undeveloped for the best interest of the public.
Given that Roosevelt governed during an era of intense American territorial expansion both domestically and abroad, his choice to designate swaths of the US as untouchable for private financial gain was unprecedented.
The National Park Service was later founded marking the early 20th century’s second major piece of land protection legislation.
Johnson’s Wilderness Act was one of the last significant wildlife preservation policies in modern American politics.
His administration’s War on Poverty, the Wilderness Act and his signing of the Civil Rights Act that same year were near the end of a powerful period for the progressive wing of the Democratic party that slowly lost influence throughout the 1970s, and conclusively ended with the landslide election of Ronald Reagan in 1980.
As the impact of the became visible to both the general public and lawmakers moving into the early 21st century, federal land that does not fall under the protection of the Wilderness Act became the center of a pressing policy debate.
While Democrats generally attempted to strike a more environmentally conscious image with voters, the Obama Administration focused on achieving American energy independence even when met with resistance from some climate advocates. By the end of his tenure as president, the White House had leased tens of millions of acres in oil and gas development land in the Gulf of Mexico and remote Alaska.
However, the Trump Administration kicked-up oil production even more intensely, with the federal government approving 40% more drilling permits during his first year in the Oval Office than Obama’s last.
The current Biden White House has overseen a continued boom in oil drilling, including on federal land, despite campaign promises that he would not allow such practices to continue. His administration argues that he has still led a positive response to the by instituting stricter environmental standards upon the energy industry.
Regardless of the political ups and downs that have dictated American environmental policy over the last sixty years, the continued impact of the Wilderness Act remains clear. As families flocked to National Forests, Parks and outdoor spaces over the Labor Day weekend, they enjoyed the benefits of a law that has placed millions of acres under legal protection for decades.
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