NEPA trumps Customs and Culture

A Rancher is just … a rancher

NEPA trumps Customs and Culture

History doesn’t Count

By Stephen L. Wilmeth

            The Martinez boys of Las Vegas, Paterson, and I had anecdotal discussions of the conflict of Tierra Amarilla and the Texan, Reies Lopez Tijerina.

            Junior and Jerry were native Nortenos and had no idea how long their ancestors had lived in northern New Mexico. Paterson and I were products of Ward Canyon and the west side of the West Side ditch, respectively. What we had in common was the fact we couldn’t alter any historical event then much less one nine generations back.

            Since the raid on the courthouse in Tierra Amarillo had taken place only two years prior to our first summer together at Gila Center, it was still a fresh topic. We listened to the view of the affair through the eyes of their Hispanic community and we offered them blow by blow of the standoff and the arrest of Mr. Tijerina.

            They gathered their hard evidence from their then San Miguel County district attorney relative. My jailhouse evidence came from my cousin, Frank, who was a party to the actual arrest. At issue was the stance of the Tijerina led La Alianza group and their beef of resolving land grant issues that emanated from the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo.

Reies, having orchestrated the shootout raid which resulted in one death, made his getaway and was on the lam. At that time, Frank was a New Mexico State Policeman and was part of a group of officers that thought they had Tijerina cornered in a private residence. He made the long walk up to the house to order the occupants to give themselves up.

Asked how far it was he had to walk largely exposed to the house, Frank remembered, “It felt like a mile, but it was probably several hundred yards.”

When he got nearly to the porch he called for the occupants to come out.

“Who is telling us to?” a woman’s voice demanded.

Shucking a shell into his AR-15, the response was something akin to, “I am!”

Alas, Reies was not part of the group, but he was well represented by his wife. The ultimate arrest would take place in Sandoval County where Frank would then transport Mr. Tijerina to the Santa Fe jail.

Reies had to provide instructions to the facility since he had been the only one in the cruiser to have spent time there!

            NEPA trumps Customs and Culture

            The recent dismissal of the remaining counts against the federal government in the case of northern New Mexico stockmen over their grazing rights on forest service lands has caused some stir. It is a double blow to stockmen like Carlos Salazar who has led the largely Hispanic Northern New Mexico Stockmen group. This ruling comes on the heels of the signal coming out of the Department of Interior that the footprint of the Del Norte National Monument will likely not be adjusted after President Trump ordered Secretary Ryan Zinke to review monuments over 100,000 acres created the past two decades.

            Recently, Mr. Salazar and I stood together after the round table discussion I was part of with the Secretary and just before his group would have a chance to discuss their issues with him. We laughed as we reminisced about the Tierra Amarillo affair fully realizing the truest racial bond that we share is not predicated on Hispanic, Anglo, rich, or poor. Our bond is spelled r-a-n-c-h-e-r. His views were my views as we talked about the growing risk of losing our heritage and the troubled world we will leave our descendants. Soon there were a growing number around us including Moises Morales and his lovely wife. Moises had been witness to the Tierra Amarillo affair with all its tension and strife. We have all stood in fierce storms.

            Out of their experience, however, the Nortenos were able to garner a policy setting forth their relationship with their lands as a cultural resource. Further, the Forest Service had to recognize it when objectives and policies were set. What they must now realize is that policy can change in midstream. It stands hollow and has been the bridge to heartache each and every time the U.S. government deals with heritage communities across the federal West.

            In his recent court ruling, U.S. District Judge, James Browning, a Bush appointee, found that the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) does not require a land management agency to consider any social or economic effects that emanate from that agency’s action. What many of us considered a basic tenet of the Act simply vanished. Based on Browning’s ruling, the physical environment trumps customs and culture. It trumps history and promises, and it reminds us that any suggestion that “the pursuit of happiness” in the Declaration of Independence will be conditional and subservient to the environment.

            A rancher is just … a rancher

            For years, those of us south of Belen have looked north thinking that the Nortenos had no idea how politically powerful they were. They carried all the politically correct armor. No Democrat in his right or left mind wanted to get crossed up in any dust up with them. We envied them in that regard because we knew that shoe didn’t fit us. We were always expendable and history proved it.

            What this ruling demonstrates, though, is that magic is gone. Whether he has been on ceremonial lands for four centuries, a millennium, or ridden in with nothing but his guts and his cows in 1880, a rancher is just … a rancher.

            Stephen L. Wilmeth is a rancher from southern New Mexico. “Carlos, my friend, our children will look at us and wonder. “Why didn’t you prevail?” they will ask. My answer will be preserved right here and now. The suggestion of pursuit of happiness was misplaced and poorly crafted. It should have been in the Constitution, made law, and written as “the pursuit of PRIVATE PROPERTY.”

Jefferson probably had in mind George Mason's Virginia Declaration of Rights (adopted June 12, 1776), which referred to "the enjoyment of life and liberty, with the means of acquiring and possessing property, and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety." 

For a treatise on the origins and meanings of "pursuit of happiness" see The Origins of the Pursuit of Happiness