America's First Conservationist

Theodore Roosevelt Protected National Heirlooms Through Establishing National Parks, Wildlife Refuges

(CBS)  On this July 4, millions of Americans are heading to national parks - many which wouldn't be here if it wasn't for Theodore Roosevelt, who left office 100 years ago. CBS News correspondent Jeff Glor sat down with CBS News historian Doug Brinkley, who has just written a book about the 26th president.

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Sagamore Hill, on Long Island in New York was Theodore Roosevelt's retreat from his home in New York City, and later Washington. It's where he forged a love of nature that lasted a lifetime.

"We're walking along water in his backyard that is now national wildlife refuge," Brinkley said.

It is part of what inspired him to make sure that places like this should be around forever, for all to enjoy.

"He believed what made the American unique and special was our wildlife, nature and getaway places," Brinkley said. "He protected 230 million acres … It is a staggering number. It's as much land as from Maine down to Florida he put aside."

It includes big name parks, which are packed this weekend: the Grand Canyon, the Florida Keys, Devil's Tower in Wyoming and Crater Lake in Oregon. Fifty-one bird reserves, 150 national forests. One out of every 10 acres in the country.

"He called them our national heirlooms," Brinkley said. "That the Grand Canyon is our Louvre, that the Redwood Trees are our Westminster Abbey, that the Tetons are our Taj Mahal."

In his new book, Brinkley says this was before conservation was a cause, and when the green revolution was still a century away. He was laughed at when he did this.

"Crazy Teddy, they used to call him," Brinkley said. "People thought that this guy, there was never a tree he didn't like!"

It may seem obvious now, but setting aside the Grand Canyon, was, at the time, hugely controversial. Congress wanted it mined for copper and zinc. When Roosevelt protected Washington State's Mt. Olympus, loggers were outraged - not that he cared.

"Roosevelt went so far as to say the number one issue in America is conservation," Brinkley said. "If we don't save our own landscape, what are we going to have?"

He didn't just save land from big business, he turned it entirely over to animals, creating the Fish and Wildlife Service, and wildlife preserves.

"He took vast millions of acres and said, these belong to birds or these belong to moose," Brinkley said. "The big thing if you had any interest in wildlife was to get an audience with Roosevelt because if you showed him pictures and said this species is in peril, he'd say, Let's save it! Let's declare it!"

Roosevelt may be better known as a Rough Rider and hunter than as an environmental crusader. But Brinkley says those different personas aren't in conflict.

"The thing to keep in mind is that the first conservationists in America were hunters," Brinkley said. "They were actually elite sportsmen and they would have hunting clubs and they wanted reserves."

"What would Roosevelt think of the state of our national parks today?" Glor asked.

"He'd be sadly shaken that we're not prioritizing them enough," Brinkley said.

The government's massive stimulus package includes more than $750 million to spruce up national parks. Nearly $11 million will go to the Grand Cannon, which Roosevelt saved all those years ago.

When politicians these days are doing something with decades ahead in mind, it's considered amazing. Roosevelt, it seems was doing things with millennia in mind.

"And that's his genius," Brinkley said. "He was thinking that far ahead. We now, as we're talking 100 years after he left the White House, we're only now catching up with the green legacy of Theodore Roosevelt."

[cydygitt1]

Maverick Gone Bad

Although it has been pointed out that Ronald Reagan (1981-1989) had been pretty solid on the environment as governor of California, he seemed to take a turn for the worse once he got to the White House. "The Reagan administration adopted an extraordinarily aggressive policy of issuing leases for oil, gas and coal development on tens of millions of acres of national lands -- more than any other administration in history, including the current one," the Wilderness Society's David Alberswerth has reported.

Perhaps setting the tone for much of his policy, Reagan famously (and bizarrely) said "trees cause more pollution than automobiles do," and that if "you've seen one tree you've seen them all." As president Reagan shocked greens by hiring the notorious James Watt and Anne Gorsuch for the heads of the Department of Interior and the EPA. The industry-friendly appointees worked tirelessly to roll back environmental regulations, from the Clean Air Act to the Clean Water Act. In the administration's first year, there was a 79 percent decline in the number of enforcement cases filed from regional offices to EPA headquarters, and a 69 percent decline in the number of cases filed from the EPA to the Department of Justice.

Reagan's Superfund director, Rita Lavelle, was sent to jail after a Congressional investigation into alleged corruption (called "Sewergate"). Lavelle returned to prison in 2005 after being accused of fraud in a case of faked environmental cleanup in the private sector.

Reagan also rolled back Carter's CAFE standards for car gas mileage, slashed funding for renewable energy (sending the burgeoning industry into a freefall it still hasn't recovered from), signed an executive order that forces unworkable evacuation plans on communities surrounding nuclear power plants, and unceremoniously ripped the solar panels off the White House. Reagan may have been a nice man, but he drove us right back into oil addiction, some say setting the stage for years of global conflict and indirect funding of terrorism.
photo credit: White House/Wikimedia Commons


Read more: http://www.thedailygreen.com/environmental-news/latest/presidents-worst-environmental-records-460808#ixzz0KOMdlFKA&C

[cydygitt1]

Why do republiCON presidents try to use and abuse our natural resources as fast and irresponsibly as possible?

[cydygitt1]

"What would Roosevelt think of the state of our national parks today?" Glor asked.

"He'd be sadly shaken that we're not prioritizing them enough," Brinkley said.

The government's massive stimulus package includes more than $750 million to spruce up national parks. Nearly $11 million will go to the Grand Cannon, which Roosevelt saved all those years ago.

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Yet today, the CONServitards that refuse to conserve one thing, continue to rail against "sprucing-up" our national park legacy to future generations, as the republiCON party of NO would rather them fall into further shambles and disrepair.

The republiCONS would rather litter the national parks, forests and BLM public lands with endless OIL drilling, endless logging and roads, endless mining, and attack all that Teddy's Fish and Wildlife Service has protected, since the GOP only worships the almighty American dollar and BIG BIZ's profits!

[cydygitt1]

"Roosevelt went so far as to say the number one issue in America is conservation," Brinkley said. "If we don't save our own landscape, what are we going to have?"

He didn't just save land from big business, he turned it entirely over to animals, creating the Fish and Wildlife Service, and wildlife preserves.

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That was 100 years ago, and today we have a republiCON party that only worships BIG BIZ and conserves nothing!

Why do CONServitards fail to conserve anything today?

[Dgunner]

I live on the border of 186000 acres of National forest. Im retired military. I spend my life guiding in these forest .My family was here before Roosevelt . My people were here before any whiteman. Without these forest the old ways of my heritage would be lost to our native youth.I enjoy the rare privilege of having everything i need to live right out side my door so do my sons there sons grandchildren.There is only one plentiful thing that i dont care to have around. People.

[cydygitt1]

Too bad the republiCON party of NO would rather just open-up all our public lands to development for BIG BIZ's profits, as the bush monkey and GOP-led congresscritters proved in places like the Tongass!

[bigsk8fan]

teddy roosevelt was quite a true charismatic leader. despite his penchant to set aside land for sportsmen enjoyment, he was not a real 'greenie' environmentalist as you see today. when it came to his heroics in cuba, he was a pretty good leader. the most experienced soldiers he had available were the old west's buffalo soldiers. teddy had no problems trashing the buffalo soldier's character just to make some unnecessary points with the white establishment.

[usshitdotcom]

what politician doesn't have a dark side........have anything you want to share on my site let me know go to www.usshit.com

[mejordelahistoria]

teddy roosevelt green? you forgot to mention his african safari where he massacred hundreds of animals for pure entertainment. The guy who wrote this book needs to do some research. Let's not forget the war with Spain was made up with false evidence also, just like the failed war in iraq under bush.

[didserve]

Remember the Maine!

[cydygitt1]

Problem is....the bush monkey was indeed the worst president of all, and along with the rest of the republiCON party of NO, worshipped BIG BIZ at the expense of good environmental and conservation practices!


Bush regime environmental record - SourceWatchMar 11, 2008 ... "This is the worst environmental president we've had in American .... Polluters First: The Bush Administration's Environmental Record. ...
www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?...Bush...environmental_record

OpEdNews » Bush Environment Record "Worst" Of All PresidentsBush Environment Record "Worst" Of All Presidents ... Daynes detailed how the Bush administration had failed the public in a number of key environmental ...
www.opednews.com/.../genera_sherwood_080519_bush_environment_rec.htm

On the Environment: Bush Administration Worst on RecordMay 19, 2008 ... On the Environment: Bush Administration Worst on Record ... Daynes detailed how the Bush administration had failed the public in a number of ...
www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=9030

Challenging Bush's Environmental Record : NPRAug 20, 2004 ... Robert Kennedy Jr., an attorney with the Natural Resources Defense Council, has called President Bush the worst environmental president in ...
www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=3861238

[cydygitt1]

"Worst Environmental President in History"

A highly polarizing figure, President George W. Bush has been widely criticized for his dismal record on the environment. In fact, leading advocate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. has said, "You simply can't talk honestly about the environment today without criticizing this president. George W. Bush will go down as the worst environmental president in our nation's history."

Kennedy's book Crimes Against Nature details how Bush has rewritten the nation's environmental laws in favor of industry and filled the ranks of regulatory agencies with former lobbyists and corporate executives.

Bush rolled back laws (and stymied enforcement) on air pollution and standards for arsenic in drinking water. He pushed to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and other federal lands to destructive drilling, promoted mountaintop removal coal mining, stepped up logging on public lands, slashed support for family planning around the world, fought against fuel economy and other efficiency standards and deliberately dragged his heels on the issue of climate change. The Bush administration has been accused of politicizing and distorting government science, particularly when it comes to global warming, and even floated a plan for corporate sponsorship of landmarks (sometimes referred to as the "Pepsi Grand Canyon" fiasco).

George W. Bush is well known for his deep ties to the oil industry, and under his leadership oil companies have enjoyed the highest profits in the history of the world, while consumers suffer sticker shock at the pump, not to mention a flagging economy and an unpopular war.



Read more: http://www.thedailygreen.com/environmental-news/latest/presidents-worst-environmental-records-460808#ixzz0KOLD0jSB&C

[whitemale08]

Teddy Roosevelt was a British asset, he didn't give a damn about the environment, he used the 'environment' as a pre-text to restrict land usage by the American peoples.

Adolf Hitler was a 'greenie' and this article is trying to fool people into this carbon-swap-tax krap.

Don't do it America, or you will be sorry!

[cydygitt1]

"ronnie the rat" raygun also rolled back Carter's CAFE standards for car gas mileage, slashed funding for renewable energy (sending the burgeoning industry into a freefall it still hasn't recovered from), signed an executive order that forces unworkable evacuation plans on communities surrounding nuclear power plants, and unceremoniously ripped the solar panels off the White House. Reagan may have been a nice man, but he drove us right back into oil addiction, some say setting the stage for years of global conflict and indirect funding of terrorism.

[didserve]

Oh by the way he was a gun owner and hunter! you missed that point!

[cydygitt1]

Perhaps setting the tone for much of his policy, Reagan famously (and bizarrely) said "trees cause more pollution than automobiles do," and that if "you've seen one tree you've seen them all."