May 1995: Why Wilderness?

by Jim Stiles

 Why wilderness? Read this...

     "The forests consisted mainly of oaks, 'the finest oaks for height and thickness one could ever see.' Poplars, hickories thrived, and quantities of plum trees were blue with fruit.

     "Songsparrows, vireos, and warblers filled the brighter edges of the forest, though they shunned the dark interior. Occasionally there was the bright scarlet flash of a tanager in passage. Hawks floated in the sky, soared, swooped, and chased their small prey into the security of thickets and tangled grapevines under the great trees. Now and then a bald eagle soared over. Above the schools of fish that packed the river soared the ospreys, plummeting down into its current occasionally to emerge mightily, with a salmon or sturgeon clutched in their talons."

     The passage comes from an old book my grandfather gave me years ago authored by John Bakeless. The Eyes of Discovery chronicles the North American continent as it lay waiting and unsuspecting for the arrival of Europeans in the early 17th century. The description is of an island then inhabited by the Manna-hata Indians. Even today we call it Manhattan Island.

     I am going to be blunt. If you can read Bakeless' graphic portrayal of a pristine land that would someday become New York City without any emotion or regret or even a bit of shame, there is something seriously wrong with you.

     East of the Rocky Mountains, the landscape has been so drastically altered by human intrusion and manipulation, I doubt if any of the original explorers would recognize the place. And we managed to do it in the span of a few short centuries. The only reason any of the North American continent has survived the ravages of our species is because of its inaccessibility or because the land itself was deemed worthless by would be exploiters who saw the land as nothing more than the commodities that could be extracted from it.

     Barely a century ago, the Deseret News described the lands of southeast Utah as "one vast 'contiguity of waste' and measurably valueless, excepting for nomadic purposes, hunting grounds for Indians, and to hold the world together."

     One vast contiguity of waste.

     A lot has changed since 1861. What was once considered worthless desert is now coveted by ranchers, miners, and recreationists alike. And now we face a decision in our state; we are supposed to decide, once and for all time, what we will save and preserve of our wildlands and what we will open up to the developers and the exploiters. In the last few months, the county governments of southern Utah have made their position clear. Any wilderness designation that conflicts with commercial development is a bad idea. The word itself...'wilderness'...has been politicized, bureaucratized, bastardized.

     The fact is, wilderness should never have become a political issue in the first place. Or an economic issue. It is, instead, a moral issue. Wilderness lands should be set aside because it's the right thing to do. Period.

     We have faced such moral decisions before. More than a century ago, at the same time southern Utah was being described as a wasteland, this country fought a war over the issue of slavery. The south claimed its economy would be devastated by its abolition and for four bloody years fought to maintain that barbaric tradition. Ultimately, the economic concerns had to take a back seat to what was right.

     In the early 20th century, children were forced to work 18 hours a day in sweat shops for pennies. When child labor laws were enacted, it must have cut into company profit margins something fierce, but it had to be done.

     When the Civil Rights Act of 1964 forced businesses to stop discriminating against human beings based on the color of their skin, and businesses closed their doors rather than serve black customers, there was, once again, an economic impact. But again, what was the choice to anyone with a conscience and a sense of morality?

     In the last five years, a number of studies have been made to determine the effect of wilderness on southern Utah. The Leaming Report, released in 1991 suggests a devastating impact on rural Utah counties. Another report claims that the interest generated by wilderness designation will create a whole new economy and will bring the World and tons of money to southern Utah.

     I would bet the truth lies somewhere in the middle, but the fact is, it doesn't matter. We have to set aside as much of our wild country as we can, because if we don't, it will vanish before our eyes as quickly as the island of Manna-hatta did four centuries ago. There is no time left.

     But how much do we save? Most rural counties don't want to save any, and some county governments have been that blunt about it. Others have identified token parcels of wilderness just to be able to say they made an effort. At many of the county wilderness hearings, opponents of wilderness vociferously fought the designation of lands they had never even seen...land they had long ago deemed useless because of its lack of economic value. Yet they still opposed wilderness simply because the "feds" were imposing more rules and regulations and interfering with their lives.

     And that is what much of the wilderness opposition is about. Years ago in an interview with then county commissioner David Knutson, my always candid friend observed that we pretty much know where all the gas and oil and exploitable minerals are. Most of those areas, which constitute 75% of the state's public lands aren't even being considered for wilderness. 

     But what if they were. Does the possibility of making a buck off an acre of land always  take precedent over other qualities and values the land might possess? Does its sheer beauty and grandeur mean nothing if we can pump a few barrels of oil from beneath it? There was a time in the history of this state when the exploitation of its mineral wealth was condemned by political and religious leaders. The threat of such exploitation caused Brigham Young to thunder to his people, "Gold is for paving streets. The business of a Saint is to stay home and make his fields green." And Mormon leader Orson F. Whitney echoed Young's sentiments when he proclaimed, "Who wishes to see Deseret, peaceful Deseret, turned into a rollicking mining camp? Not the Latter day Saints!"

     Among those who oppose and even fear wilderness designation, there is one concern with which I completely share. In a recent letter to the Deseret News, Moab resident Lilly Mae Noorlander expressed concern for another threat to the wildlands of southern Utah. Recreational exploitation, in Ms. Noorlander's mind, is as destructive as any cow or miner could ever hope to be.

     "Long-forgotten ranches," Noorlander observes, "abandoned decades ago by the lonely miner or driller, are now front page fare in the full-color marketing pieces of this lucrative industry...Some of the direct consequences of their promotional activities, aside from generating profit from calendars, hiking exposes and membership dues include: more foot trails, bike trails, garbage, human waste, instructional signs, regulations, law enforcement patrols, costs to local government for crowd control, and a general loss of peace and serenity to the plaid clad, waffle stomper crowd.

     "The spirit of wilderness," concludes Lilly Mae, "has already been stolen by those who profess to be its savior, but who have, in fact, trampled the life out its essential serenity and solitude in an orgy of self-indulgence."

     Strong words and I agree with almost all of them. Unfortunately, she assumes that all environmentalists are guilty of this kind of behavior, the same way many of us condemn all ranchers for the damage cattle can cause to this fragile desert of ours. We all constitute a threat to wilderness, as any of us who just survived another Easter Weekend and tens of thousands of recreationists know. That's why, if I had my way with wilderness, I would protect it in ways that would avoid even the possibility of commercial exploitation.

     I would prohibit any outfitter or guide company from leading tours through wilderness areas for profit. I would eliminate the possibility of allowing rich doctors and lawyers from Denver or San Francisco to set up guided trips for themselves at several hundred dollars a day, to be led by the hand all day and fed gourmet food in the evening, because they don't have the time or the energy or the inclination to see wild country any other way. This is not the place for "soft adventure," a nauseating term some river companies now use to describe their guided trips down the Colorado River. 

     And if wilderness lands began to show signs of impact from overuse, I would support the idea of closing such areas to everyone. Is this putting more power into the hands of the "feds?" Maybe. But no one could possibly say they were favoring one special interest group over another.

     Dave Foreman once suggested we allow wilderness areas to literally become blank spots on the map...NO DAMN GUIDE BOOKS. Let them become places of mystery and adventure. Make it clear to everyone who chooses to explore the wilderness that they enter at their own risk. That they will not be rescued if they turn an ankle or break a leg. No one will bring them water if they fail to carry enough with them. We enter the wilderness and we leave our cellular phones at the boundary.   

 

     In the next six months, the Utah Congressional delegation will introduce wilderness legislation. If, in addition to dramatically reducing the total acreage, the bill contains "hard-release" language that eliminates additional wilderness consideration in the future, we will have made a tragic mistake.

     We have an opportunity to look beyond the span of our own lives and present a gift to people we will never know. It is the most precious gift we could ever leave to those that will walk this desert long after our bones have turned to dust.

     Or we can stare at our feet, ignore the future, and know without any doubt that our generation will someday be condemned by descendants who will never experience what we could have saved but chose instead to squander.