Restoring Rural American Rights and Prosperity
by Jim Beers
As this is being written:
* Union rioters are seizing State Capitol buildings in Wisconsin, Indiana, and Ohio.
* State legislators are fleeing their states to avoid the wrath of their Union supporters.
* Chronic national unemployment is on everyone’s mind.
* National and State debts threaten to bankrupt and even destroy government.
* National and State Budgets cause hostility everywhere as calls for comity abound.
* Budget Cuts v. Tax Increases reflect the deep political division emerging everywhere.
* Unfunded entitlements from government pensions to social and medical promises loom.
* Housing prices and construction are in the worst shape since the 1930’s.
* Banks, loans, business futures, insurance costs, and federal funds are all questionable.
* Middle East and African governments are falling with unknowable future rulers.
* Oil and energy prices are exploding as federal policies are unclear and threatening.
Additionally, Rural America is depressed and reeling from ±40 years of federal government policies that treat federal lands as distinct from the states and local communities wherein they are located (i.e. Wilderness Declarations, Road Closures, abandonment of renewable natural resource management and use, revenue-generating and revenue-sharing management practices from grazing and timber management to wildlife uses, “Travel Management” Plans, Permits requirements, etc.); from the effects of steadily expanded and unconstitutional federal powers under the Endangered Species Act (ESA); from Taking Without Compensation and disregard for both state authorities and private property; from administrative takeover of state agencies and changing the ESA from “saving species” to selectively restoring species anywhere at will and even mortally endangering human safety with “GI” (Government Introduced) wolves; and an arrogant disregard for those affected.
A few of the many examples of this are:
* GI Wolves are a growing menace to humans in half of the contiguous 48 states.
* GI Wolves are destroying livestock, game animals, and petss in Rural America.
* Sucker fish are being used to destroy agriculture in the Klamath Basin in Oregon.
* Salmon are being used to destroy dams and thereby energy production and users.
* Salmon are being used to destroy fishing and to justify Marine Sanctuaries.
* Smelt are being used to limit and eliminate California agricultural production.
* Snail Darters are being used to reduce dams and interject federal authority in Tennessee.
* Black Bears are increasingly destructive to rural interests in Louisiana and Florida.
* Spotted Owls are being used to destroy western timber management over tens of millions of acres.
* Grizzly Bears are steadily killing more people and livestock.
* Red-cockaded Woodpeckers are being used to greatly diminished Southern private timber production.
* Ivory-billed Woodpeckers (extinct for 60+ years) are being used to condemn Southern forests.
* Sage-grouse are being used to threaten and reduce western energy corridors and ranching.
* Whales are being used to destroy and depress both commercial and sport fisheries.
* Sea Otters are being used to destroy abalone fisheries.
* Sea lions are being used to destroy salmon fisheries.
To summarize all this, America is in deep trouble for the foreseeable future. The federal government must cut back because of debt, many state governments are in desperate need of funding to avoid bankruptcy, and Rural America has the additional burdens of unusable public land renewable resources and an Endangered Species Act that takes private property without compensation, which increasingly expresses authority over more and more of Rural American life and Rural American economies to great detriment.
THEREFORE, in order to reduce future federal costs and future federal tax demands while simultaneously increasing revenue to states and local communities, I propose the following federal legislation to rescue an Endangered Rural America and to restore Prosperity to the 50 states that compose this great nation.
*RURAL AMERICA RECOVERY AND RESTORATION ACT*
This Act consists of two parts.
Part I
All lands owned or controlled by the US Government, except for those controlled by the Department of Defense and other specifically named herein lands, are hereby transferred to the ownership and control of the state government within which such parcels of land are located.
(Note to reader: Canada did this in 1929. All those non-private lands in Canada that are revenue producers from tourism, forage (grazing) and tree (forestry) management, hunting, fishing and trapping, and energy production are owned and managed by Provinces — the Canadian equivalents to our States. Canada exports lots of timber, meat, and energy AND they still have world-class wildlife, trees, and habitats that attract tourists from around the world. The same thing here in the US is to be expected if state governments controlled Rural America and state and local needs and interests predominated in the management of Rural American public lands. Additionally, state and local politicians or bureaucrats that did not manage those lands with the local community in mind would soon be unelected, which is not true of federal politicians and federal overseers. Not only would federal bureaucracy costs be eliminated and thereby federal tax needs and debt accrual similarly reduced, state coffers (and even the national coffer) would be increased with the NEW revenues generated for the rural communities and state budgets by the increased economic activity and jobs generated by the renewal of the active management and use of renewable natural resources for future generations that would once again have a STAKE in the management of the RURAL RESOURCES that sustain them. State bureaucracy employees would be surely only a small percentage of the army of federal bureaucrats currently employed by federal agencies. State ownership would also imply state (the new owners) priorities and the redefinition of current federal legal mandates that currently suppress economic growth and steadily evacuate Rural America while wasting American resources and vitality.)
Part II
The Endangered Species Act is hereby amended in the following manner:
1. Only SPECIES; not subspecies, race, Population, Population Segment, or Distinct Population Segment; may be considered under this Act.
2. Only species endangered worldwide may be considered under this Act.
3. Any Taking of property and/or property values by federal agencies operating under this Act must be accompanied by just compensation to the property owners as described in the 5th Amendment to the US Constitution.
4. No authority under this Act may be used to restore Native Species beyond the magnitude necessary to assure their worldwide survival without the express consent of the Legislature and Governor of the concerned State or States and as expressly authorized by the US Congress.
5. Any actions including entry upon private property by government agents, the taking of private property, values, and/or property rights, and actions which directly affect the authority or economy of the State, may not be undertaken without the express consent of the Legislature and Governor of that State.
6. The authority of State governments over the plants and animals of that State and the authority of Local governments such as Counties and Townships shall be protected and not diminished as far as is practicable by any actions taken under this Act.
7. That before any recommendation for non-voluntary action under this Act by either State government or the citizen is made, the federal role should be first to publish research and recommendations for the recovery of an Endangered Species, second to offer all available dispositions of help on any and all federally-controlled lands, and third exhaust all means of obtaining voluntary compliance of needed actions.
8. Each Species Restoration Program must be specifically and annually authorized by the US Congress.
9. Native Species are hereby defined as subjects appropriate for academic study and examination to determine expected outcomes of current and future actions. Neither Native Species restoration nor Native Ecosystem restoration is an appropriate goal or purpose of any federally funded action not specifically approved by the US Congress.
10. Invasive Species are hereby defined as harmful plant or animal species that are or could be an active threat to the citizens or economic life of the nation or group of states. Invasive species are not to be considered as simply plants or animals that were not here before a certain date such as 1492 AD or 1776 AD, nor are they animals considered as game animals by any state. Invasive species are to be excluded from import into the United States, and federal cooperation with states to conduct research or enable control or eradication when desirable must be authorized specifically by the US Congress. Such control or eradication of such species may not be initiated in any state without the express consent of the Legislature and Governor of such state.
There you have it! A simple two-part Act to transfer most federal lands to state ownership and revise through a series of Amendments, The Endangered Species Act. This Act would decrease federal budget requirements and increase federal and state revenues while creating millions of jobs and revitalizing Rural American Prosperity.
In times like these, how could anyone be opposed to something like this that saves money, costs nothing, increases jobs, and restores prosperous rural communities that have been a common hallmark of advanced and successful nations from Europe and Britain to the United States and Canada?
Jim Beers is a retired US Fish and Wildlife Service Wildlife Biologist, Special Agent, Refuge Manager, Wetlands Biologist, and Congressional Fellow. He was stationed in North Dakota, Minnesota, Nebraska, New York City, and Washington DC. He also served as a US Navy Line Officer in the western Pacific and on Adak, Alaska in the Aleutian Islands. He has worked for the Utah Fish and Game, Minneapolis Police Department, and as a Security Supervisor in Washington, DC. He testified three times before Congress; twice regarding the theft by the US Fish and Wildlife Service of $45 to 60 Million from State fish and wildlife funds and once in opposition to expanding Federal Invasive Species authority. He resides in Eagan, Minnesota with his wife of many decades.
