Interior Department does not recommend overturning any designations
August 28, 2017 — The Interior Department’s conclusion of a contentious review of national monuments might give Congress some impetus to revisit the Antiquities Act of 1906, which presidents of both parties have used to designate monuments through executive action.
House Natural Resources Chairman Rob Bishop on Thursday called for Congress to overhaul the Antiquities Act to place “reasonable limits” on the way presidents use the statute. Bishop’s statements came shortly before the Interior Department submitted recommendations to the White House after an executive-ordered review of monument designations made over the last two decades.
Bishop, a Utah Republican and forceful critic of federal control of public lands in the West, said in a call with reporters that the Obama administration had abused the statute that allows presidents to designate national monuments without congressional action. The Interior review, he said, was necessary because some of the designations were a result of abuse of the statute and did not allow for adequate input by local communities.
“If we don’t reform the Antiquities Act, we will have a replication of failures,” Bishop said. “If the procedure is flawed, the product is going to be flawed.”
Former President Barack Obama’s most contentious designation, the creation of the 1.3 million-acre Bears Ears monument, drew much opposition from Bishop and other Utah lawmakers, who lobbied the Trump administration for its reversal. Another of the more contentious ones is Maine’s Katahdin Woods and Waters National Monument, which marked its first anniversary Thursday.