Donald Trump’s interior secretary, Ryan Zinke, will be in Nevada
later this month to tour two new national monuments, Gold Butte and
Basin and Range. That’s a welcome departure from the previous
administration, which simply waved a magic wand from 2,400 miles away to
restrict land use across wide swaths of the state.
The president has vowed to roll back a number of designations Barack
Obama made under the 1906 Antiquities Act, which could affect the two
new Nevada monuments. Mr. Zinke recently recommended that one such
recent designation in Utah — Bears Ears — be downsized from its current
2,000 square miles.
Environmentalists will no doubt fight the decision in court. Expect a
similar response if Mr. Zinke makes changes at Gold Butte or Basin and
Range.
The Associated Press reported over the weekend that other presidents
have previously made adjustments to monument boundaries — 18 times
according to the National Park Service. Nevertheless, “environmentalist
groups and others gearing for a fight” say the 1976 Federal Land Policy
and Management Act restricts a president’s right to narrow the scope of a
national monument.
The courts will eventually have the final say. But all this legal
wrangling simply offers another reason for repealing the Antiquities
Act. Major decisions about federal land designations should be in the
hands of legislative branch, not the purview of an imperial president or
the bureaucracy.
If members of Congress or the president seek to create a new national
monument, let lawmakers hold hearings and cast votes. The same process
should apply for any subsequent movement to tinker with or eliminate
such designations. That’s called representative democracy.
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