Designation of National Monuments: Overview

Introduction

In 1906, President Theodore Roosevelt signed a law known as the American Antiquities Act, which gave the president of the United States the ability to designate as a national monument any land or structure owned or controlled by the United States federal government. Although the law was initially intended to protect archaeological sites and similar areas of historical value in the Southwest from the looting and destruction common at the time, it soon came to be used by Roosevelt and subsequent presidents to conserve a vast range of environments and natural sites with historical, scientific, or environmental value. Between 1906 and 2017, more than 150 sites were designated as national monuments, and presidents at times used the power granted to them by the Antiquities Act to expand the size of existing monuments. The monuments created ranged in size from small areas such as the African Burial Ground Monument in New York City, which measures less than half an acre in size, to large marine monuments such as Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument, in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Hawaii, which encompasses more than 500,000 square miles of ocean and islands.

Although the powers granted by the Antiquities Act were used frequently during the first half of the twentieth century, questions soon arose regarding whether it was appropriate for large areas of land to be deemed protected based on presidential authority alone. While the creation of national parks required congressional approval, the creation of national monuments did not, nor did it require the approval of the governments and residents of the states in which the monuments were established. The debate about the designation of national monuments continued through the second half of the twentieth century and into the early twenty-first, as Presidents Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama collectively designated more than fifty monuments between 2000 and 2017. In the first decades of the twenty-first century, opponents of the designation of national monuments via the Antiquities Act argued that the power to establish such monuments should not belong to the president alone and that the creation of national monuments can have a detrimental effect on the people who live nearby by restricting the use of the land and its resources. Supporters of the president's ability to designate national monuments argue that the creation of such monuments is necessary to protect the United States' natural, historical, and cultural resources from destruction or exploitation and that national monuments ultimately benefit local economies by attracting tourism to the surrounding regions. The subject was opened for further debate when President Donald Trump significantly reduced the size of two previously designated national monuments in Utah in 2017.

Understanding the Discussion

American Antiquities Act: A 1906 law that gives the US president the authority to designate as a national monument any land owned or controlled by the federal government.

Bureau of Land Management (BLM): A federal bureau created in 1946 that is responsible for managing US public lands, including some of the United States' national monuments.

National monument: A federally protected area that is preserved for its historical or scientific value and may be designated as such directly by the president.

National park: A federally protected area that is preserved for its recreational or educational value and is designated as such through an act of Congress.

National Parks Service (NPS): A federal agency created in 1916 that manages the United States' national parks and the majority of its national monuments.

History

In the late nineteenth century, archaeologists and historians in the United States began to be concerned by the amount of looting and other forms of destruction taking place in the southwestern region of the country, which featured many important archaeological sites related to American Indian history and culture as well as prominent geological features. They sought to protect such cultural and environmental resources from further threats. In response, Congress passed and President Roosevelt signed the American Antiquities Act in June 1906. The Antiquities Act established punishments for individuals who excavated, removed, or destroyed artifacts or ruins located on lands owned or controlled by the United States government without federal permission. In addition, the act authorized the president of the United States to designate any land or other structure that was owned or controlled by the United States government as a national monument for the purpose of protecting its historical or scientific value. Roosevelt used his newly granted authority for the first time that fall, establishing the Devils Tower National Monument in Wyoming on September 24, 1906. He went on to designate seventeen additional monuments during his time in office, including monuments at Chaco Canyon in New Mexico and the Grand Canyon in Arizona.

Subsequent presidents likewise designated a variety of national monuments throughout the United States, including Dinosaur National Monument, created in Utah and Colorado by President Woodrow Wilson; the Statue of Liberty National Monument in New York, designated by President Calvin Coolidge; and Joshua Tree National Monument, later a national park, in California designated by President Franklin Roosevelt. In addition to protecting areas of the US mainland that featured important archaeological sites, large geological formations, or natural features such as forests and deserts, national monuments also came to encompass islands and areas of ocean. In light of their varying sizes, locations, and natural features, national monuments came to be managed by several different government bodies, most notably the National Park Service (NPS), which by 2017 was responsible for overseeing more than one hundred of the United States' national monuments in addition to the country's national parks. The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) oversaw a number of monuments, primarily in the western United States, while marine monuments were typically managed by specialized government agencies such as the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

At times, a president's decision to designate a new national monument has sparked conflicts between the president and Congress as well as between the president and the government and residents of the state in which the monument is located. In 1943, Franklin Roosevelt's creation of the Jackson Hole monument in Wyoming, later part of Grand Teton National Park, was met with opposition from Congress and some Wyoming politicians. Congress even made an unsuccessful attempt dissolve the monument with a bill. The 1978 move by President Jimmy Carter to establish monuments in Alaska encompassing more than 50 million acres met with a similar response, particularly from Alaskan residents. In both cases, while the monuments ultimately continued to exist and were later incorporated into larger areas of protected land, their establishment led to the passage of legislation restricting the president's ability to establish national monuments in those specific states. Following Carter's 1978 monument designations, the powers granted by the Antiquities Act were not used again until 1996, when President Bill Clinton established the 1.7-million-acre Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument in Utah. In total, more than one hundred national monuments were designated by US presidents between 1906 and the end of the 1990s.

Designation of National Monuments Today

During the first decades of the twenty-first century, the designation of national monuments remained an issue of great importance, as the first three presidents to serve during that period—Clinton, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama—designated numerous parcels of federal land and other structures as national monuments. Between the start of 2000 and his last day in office the following year, Clinton designated eighteen national monuments in locations such as Arizona, the District of Columbia, and the US Virgin Islands. Bush added six monuments, primarily large Pacific marine monuments such as the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands monument, which would be expanded and renamed the Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument under the Obama administration. Over the course of his two terms, Obama designated twenty-nine monuments in addition to expanding monuments such as Papahānaumokuākea. Among the notable additions to the United States' national monuments during that period were several monuments related to struggles for civil rights, including the Freedom Riders National Monument in Alabama and the Stonewall National Monument in New York, as well as the first marine monument in the Atlantic Ocean, the Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument. Following the election of President Donald Trump, individuals and organizations opposed to some of the monuments established by Obama urged the incoming president to abolish those particular monuments. Although Presidents Taft, Wilson, and Eisenhower all reduced the size of national monuments, they did so largely based on newer, more accurate information and their changes went unchallenged. Similarly, past Congresses have reclassified national monuments or even eliminated them. However, as the Antiquities Act does not state whether a president has the authority to revoke monument status granted by a previous president, the legality of Trump's proposed action was unclear.

In April 2017, Trump instructed Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke to review national monuments designated from 1996 onward that encompassed at least 100,000 acres, with particular attention to the public consultation process and economic impacts they had. In August, Zinke recommended retaining six monuments unchanged, and that December, the administration declared that the area of the Grand Staircase-Escalante would be halved and that of Bears Ears National Monument, also in Utah, would be cut to 228,784 acres from 1,350,000. Shortly after the announcement, several environmental groups and Native American tribes filed lawsuits against the Trump administration for its decision. In September 2019, a federal judge rejected the Trump administration's bid to dismiss the lawsuit, instead ruling that legal action could proceed against the decision to reduce the size of the monuments.

As presidents such as Obama designated numerous new national monuments, the debate surrounding the issue intensified, with opponents characterizing such designations as federal land grabs; note, however, the monument status can only be applied to lands already under federal ownership or control. Opponents of presidential designation of national monuments have argued that in creating such monuments, the federal government overreaches by unduly restricting the types of activities that may take place on the land. As the creation of national monuments has at times prevented profitable activities such as mining from taking place in certain regions, opponents assert that designation of national monuments has a detrimental economic effect on communities as well as detrimental social and cultural effects from banning certain types of recreation. Many opponents of the Antiquity Act powers argue that instead of being created through presidential action alone, national monuments should instead be designated only with the approval of Congress and the states in question. Others have suggested time-limiting the designations or altering the Antiquities Act such that the president's authority would conform to other, later laws on federal land management and environmental protection. Opponents have included state officials in Western states with large monument designations, such as Utah and Maine, as well as blue-collar workers in industries affected by the designations, such as fishermen.

Proponents of the existing system of national monument designation, on the other hand, argue that protecting the United States' natural, historical, cultural, and scientific resources is of paramount importance and that designating potentially threatened areas as national monuments is an effective way of shielding such areas from destruction or exploitation. Concerned by potential threats such as climate change, industrialization, or damage to historic and sacred artifacts, environmental activists and American Indian tribal governments assert that the powers granted to the president by the Antiquities Act are both appropriate in scope and necessary.

These essays and any opinions, information, or representations contained therein are the creation of the particular author and do not necessarily reflect the opinion of EBSCO Information Services.

About the Author

Joy Crelin is a freelance writer and editor based in Wethersfield, Connecticut. She holds a bachelor of fine arts degree in writing, literature, and publishing from Emerson College.

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