A blueprint for balance in public land management

Excerpt

AMERICA is blessed with the ingredients of greatness. We have the essential natural resources—fertile land, abundant water, plentiful timber, vast quantities of energy and minerals. But having the essential natural resources is not enough. A nation must also have the human resources to develop natural resources, and it must provide the political climate to foster wise development.

America has been a “land of plenty” because its people have been a people with freedom. For most of our history, we have encouraged venture and growth by not standing in the way of those with new ideas and the determination to put our resources to work for people. America faltered in the past decade when we, as a nation, seemed to lose confidence in our human resources, in our ability to manage our natural resources wisely. For example, the energy crisis was really a leadership crisis, a failure to pursue policies that would develop our enormous energy resources.

America's loss of faith in its human resources was manifest during the 1970s in policies designed to put more and more land under federal jurisdiction, to “protect” it from the states, cities, and counties and from …