Flood Control Act (FCA)
The Flood Control Act (FCA) of 1944 was a significant piece of legislation in the United States aimed at managing the Missouri River, which is crucial for navigation, irrigation, and flood control across a vast region. The act, part of Franklin D. Roosevelt's extensive public works initiatives, sought to redesign the river to harness its potential for hydroelectric power and support agriculture while ensuring environmental protection for its wildlife. Known as the Pick-Sloan Act, it was named after General Lewis Pick and William Glenn Sloan, who played key roles in its development.
The FCA authorized the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to oversee various water development and flood control projects in consultation with state officials. This led to the construction of numerous dams and levees, creating over fifty lakes that serve recreational purposes today. Additionally, the act was also a significant job creator, particularly for veterans returning from World War II. However, the FCA raised important concerns about federal involvement in local development, as it resulted in the displacement of thousands of Native Americans and flooding of extensive tribal lands, particularly affecting the Lakota and Dakota tribes. Overall, the Flood Control Act represents a transformative yet complex chapter in the history of river management in the United States.
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Flood Control Act (FCA)
The Law: U.S. federal law designed to direct and coordinate significant water development projects in the Missouri River basin
Date: Enacted on December 22, 1944
To help control chronic flooding along the Missouri River and to help irrigate the Great Plains, the Flood Control Act of 1944 provided a sweeping vision for reconceiving the river basin and a practical apparatus for the federal construction of dams and levees to achieve that reconstruction.
Although the Dust Bowl of the southern plains received far more national attention during the economic catastrophe of the 1930’s, chronic flooding along the Missouri River was responsible for disastrous property losses in the same period (the river drains more than one-sixth of the continental United States). Navigation on the river was unreliable, and the unpredictable depth of the river (at different points it was a meandering stream, at others a broad and swift river) meant that it generated little hydropower. Further, despite its considerable length (more than 4,000 kilometers, or 2,500 miles), the river was largely neglected as an irrigation source for the arid northern plains states.
The Flood Control Act of 1944, passed in the second session of the Seventy-eighth Congress, was breathtaking in its scope even among the numerous large-scale public works projects authorized by Franklin D. Roosevelt’s presidential administration. Never had river management on such a scale been undertaken by the federal government. The act envisioned nothing less than the redesign of the Missouri River; it aimed to develop the river’s considerable commercial potential for hydroelectric energy and for the agriculture industry while at the same time protecting both the river itself and its wildlife and fish resources. It was known as the Pick-Sloan Act, named for two men largely responsible for proposing the enormous reach of the legislation: General Lewis Pick, who directed the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, and William Glenn Sloan, who served in the Department of the Interior.
The Flood Control Act authorized the Army Corps of Engineers, in consultation with specific cabinet officers and the governors of affected states, to direct water development projects along the broad reach of the Missouri: irrigation projects through the Department of the Interior, flood-control projects with direct impacts on navigation through the Department of the Army, and projects designed to protect against soilerosion and river sedimentation through the Department of Agriculture. In addition, the Corps of Engineers would develop and maintain public parks and recreational facilities along the river.
The most immediate impacts of the act were realized in dozens of dams (and modifications of existing dams), as well as in miles of levees erected along the main stem of the Missouri. Those dams, in turn, created more than fifty lakes that continue to be used as recreational facilities (for boating, fishing, and swimming) as well as reservoirs for generating hydroelectric power. As public works legislation, the Flood Control Act was responsible for creating thousands of jobs, particularly among veterans returning from World War II. The act in turn authorized the Pick-Sloan Missouri River Basin Program to coordinate river projects.
Although the water-control projects authorized by the act provided long-term control of flooding in the Missouri basin as well as improved navigation on the river, the legislation also raised significant questions concerning the reach of the federal government into local development. Thousands of Native Americans were displaced from their homes by the projects, and hundreds of thousands of hectares of tribal lands were flooded, most notably those of the Lakota and Dakota tribes.
Bibliography
Andrews, Richard N. L. Managing the Environment, Managing Ourselves: A History of American Environmental Policy. 2d ed. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 2006.
O’Neill, Karen M. Rivers by Design: State Power and the Origins of U.S. Flood Control. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 2006.
Schneiders, Robert Kelley. Unruly River: Two Centuries of Change Along the Missouri. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1999.
Thorson, John E. River of Promise, River of Peril: The Politics of Managing the Missouri River. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1994.