The purpose of the public land is to protect and manage wildlife, resources and replenish if necessary. 

Public Domain

Please note that this legislation has been mentioned in the archival collection of the Sagebrush Rebellion in the Utah State University Archives, but there are not descriptions or details of what these acts entail and are used for. Thus the outside resources have been used to help “complete” the understanding of the information found in the archives.

National Forest Management Act 1976

This act was passed to help manage renewable resources on national forest lands. The Secretary of Agriculture is to assess the lands yearly to develop management resource plans to help conserve, protect, and use appropriately the public forest land. They are in charge of implementing these plans so that continued use, enjoyment, and profitability can be made on these lands. [1] More specifically the NFMA has enabled a way to curb the harm and destruction being done to the ecosystems by clear-cutting forests and excessive logging. Each area of National Forest would be reviewed and a plan put in place to help keep the forest in its original healthy form.[2]

Knutson Vandenberg Act

This act passed in 1930 by Congress was again to help sustain reforestation. This specific act asked for a withhold of funds from a timber sale to be put back into the land to plant new trees and sustain new forest growth so that the timber industry could continue. [3]

Mineral Leasing Act 1920 

This act enabled land to be leased out for mining opportunities. Prior to this act, a lengthy process was involved, starting by finding a mining material and having to prove a claim to the land. This act allows miners to have a greater access to good mining areas - and pay a smaller portion of the land. While not all mining options are available under this act, the most prominent and profitable ore/minerals are included.[4]

Federal Land Policy and Management Act of 1976 

This is perhaps the most relevant and important piece of legislation dealing with the public lands and what they are today. This act created the multiple-use management. This allowed the BLM, first and most prominently, with help from the National Forest Service and National Park Service, to manage these lands and to create restrictions to help preserve them. “The agency would balance its management of the land to meet diverse needs, including recreation, grazing, timber, and mineral production, fish and wildlife protection, and oil and gas production.”[5] The goal of this act is to continue to manage the land so that the public can enjoy it without destroying important resources that sustain both human life and wildlife.

There may be questions as to why you need to understand the legislation when it is mentioned nowhere else in this exhibit. The fact of the matter is that this legislation has been passed to keep certain lands, wildlife, and resources available to the public but maintained in such a way that they can be preserved. In all the acts mentioned above, it is the expectation that certain field assessments be made to create management plans to ensure that the public lands are being well maintained, preserved and used in the best way possible. The limits the BLM places on the land are not to keep you from enjoying nature in the way you want, they are there to preserve the natural beauty and resources it contains. When the Sagebrush Rebellion is looked at from this perspective, it is clear that the Federal Government knows what they are doing in respect to public lands and their management. These lands can be, and have been, properly managed both in cost and labor for many years and will continue in the same pattern as well.