This editorial by Matthew Copeland—whose story “Hooked on the High Life” is in the March/April 2015 issue of Sporting Classics—first appeared in a slightly different form on Stalking the Seam, an online project Copeland coproduces. We found his passion engaging, and he was kind enough to let us share the piece here on Sporting Classics Daily. His remarks may inspire as much as they challenge, but we appreciate his candor and his concern for the issues of pubic lands and sportsmen’s access. — JR Sullivan, online editor
Stacks of articles and level-headed opinions have been written about our nation’s slinking progress toward the wholesale transfer of federal land to states and the ongoing efforts to stop it. See Todd Tanner, Bob Marshall, Scott Willoughby, Ben Neary, Judith Kohler, Raph Graybill, and as always Hal Herring for particularly eloquent examples. What follows here is not as civil—I’m angry, and I’m frightened. I believe that anyone who isn’t angry and frightened isn’t paying attention. And I believe the time for polite discourse has passed.
Open-minded, well-informed considerations of issues are critical for the health of any democracy. In fact, I think the erosion of such vigorous debate in our country explains many of our current ills—but the public-land transfer is not a topic in which reasonable adults should disagree. It’s not a “topic” at all; it’s attempted robbery—a bald-faced, unabashed, mass swindling. And lawmakers have damn near pulled it off.
Our public lands are our most economically valuable national assets, responsible for raking billions of dollars into the national coffers each year and supporting lucrative free-market economic activity. Politicians have swept mankind’s pockets since we outbred the hunter-gatherer clan structure, but we’re talking now about selling 28 percent of our country.
The issue would be difficult enough to swallow if it were just land and money at stake, but there’s more to it than that: What’s ultimately at risk is our way of life, who we are as a nation, how we live as a people, and what it means to be American—all of which have sprouted from the public soil of our great republic. Public land is the bedrock on which our national mythology is built.
The cowboys, mountain men, and pioneers wouldn’t have existed without public land. Huckleberry Finn is a public-land story and so is Call of the Wild, Lonesome Dove, and A River Runs Through It. “Don’t Fence Me In” and “America the Beautiful” were written about a landscape with equal access for all. Public lands put the wild in the Wild West. Our spirit of exploration and adventure is tethered to the distant horizon and the freedom to cross the ground in between. Without public land, hunting, fishing, hiking, and camping are reduced to commercial transactions and restricted to those who can afford them. Are we still American without room in America to roam?
Surely, the people who represent us wouldn’t threaten something so central to our economy, national identity, and lifestyle? Maybe in a backwater banana republic or a former Soviet state, but such gross injustice, such shameless theft could never happen here, right?
One would think.
But the barbarians are at the gate; they’re coming for what we hold dear, and they’re already winning. With the passing of SA 838, in March 2015, 51 US senators threw down the gauntlet, spit in our eyes, and made their intentions clear: They’re rewriting the laws to take our land. The threat is real, and it’s really happening.
And let us be clear: we are being disregarded. The senators and state governments who’ve led us to the brink of calamity know exactly what they’re doing. They’re not stupid, and they’re not misinformed; they haven’t misunderstood the American sentiment—they just don’t care. They don’t care because they’ve sized us up, taken our measure, and deemed us impotent. Maybe they figure we’re scared enough of the long-promised but never-materialized gun-snatching bogeyman that we won’t dare abandon their protection. Maybe they figure we’re so absorbed by Netflix and Clash of Clans that we’ve lost track of the real world. Maybe they’ve just done the math and decided we’re already beaten…
Index: Our Public Lands
Acres of federal public land in the US: 640,000,000
US public-land owners: 320,590,000
Hunters and anglers who rely on public land: 69%
Westerners who’ve used public lands in the past year: 95%
Annual outdoor recreation economy supported by public lands: $646 billion
Jobs supported by public lands recreation: 6,100,000
Sportsmen’s groups and outdoor businesses that oppose transfer: 114
Western voters (the supposed beneficiaries of transfer) opposing the transfer: 67%
Senators who voted to open the door to wide-scale divestment of public land: 51
State governments who’ve moved to “reclaim” federal public land: 7
Politicians voted from office for supporting sell-off efforts: 0
I have to admit that, so far, from their perspective, the math looks pretty sound. I could compile reams more of compelling numbers—in fact, the capable professionals at the National Wildlife Federation, Backcountry Hunters & Anglers, and Colorado College have done just that. But, at this point, there’s only one calculation that carries weight: unless the big fat zero at the end of the above list changes, the behavior of our elected officials won’t change, either.
I was born in Charlottesville, Virginia, and with my first squalling breath I inherited one million squares miles of the most beautiful real estate on planet earth—boom, a geo-genetic jackpot winner just like every natural-born American citizen. I can wander where I choose, hunt in the hills, fish in the rivers, lose myself in the mountains, or find myself in the desert. Millions of naturalized immigrants earned these rare and precious privileges with the sweat of their brows. Millions more Americans have defended these lands with the blood in their veins. Now, regardless of our previous paths, we all face the same question: Will our kids know these freedoms or will they become disenfranchised visitors on someone else’s property?
So please, get on the phone. Tell your elected officials they need to fix this. Follow the call with a letter—or three. Then get back on the phone and ask your friends, family, neighbors, and coworkers to do the same. Sign the Sportsmen’s Access Petition. Hold a rally. Wave placards. Go to the next town hall meeting and speak your mind. Demand to know where candidates for public office stand on our public lands. Keep score.
Then vote your conscience. +++
Be sure to sign up for our daily newsletter to get the latest from Sporting Classics straight to your inbox.
Cover image courtesy of Parker Gibbs/Unsplash