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A new interactive report from the Center for Western Priorities explores the history of opposition to eight national parks and monuments. The Wrong Side of History envisions the destruction that could have been if these places weren’t protected.
Despite their popularity, proposals for public land protections almost always face vehement opposition from small but vocal minorities. These criticisms are nothing new. For over a century, parks and monuments that protect our country’s proudest landscapes have been established despite heated—sometimes violent—opposition. Even the most celebrated parks once faced the same tired objections as today’s national monument proposals. If presidents and congressional leaders in the past had listened to these opposing voices, iconic landscapes like Grand Teton, Rocky Mountain, and Joshua Tree National Parks would likely have been marred by mining and logging operations.
This report follows a report released by the Center for Western Priorities in 2016 which explored the opposition faced by another set of parks and monuments. This report looks at Bears Ears, Avi Kwa Ame, and Baaj Nwaavjo I’tah Kukveni–Ancestral Footprints of the Grand Canyon national monuments, which faced the same empty and misinformed opposition highlighted in the 2016 report.
“Landscapes like Oregon’s Owyhee Canyonlands are likely to remain unprotected and open to development unless state-level leaders are willing to ask President Biden to designate them as national monuments,” said Center for Western Priorities Creative Content and Policy Manager Lilly Bock-Brownstein. “Future generations will thank them for protecting these extraordinary places and look back on their opponents as being on the wrong side of history.”.
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The American public deserves to benefit from their public lands and waters, but Project 2025 would ensure that the oil and gas elite have access first.”
