Over the course of more than a century, Congress—or the executive branch using expressed authorities granted by Congress—has established various systems for the conservation, management, and enjoyment of federal and other lands and waters. On the whole, these systems are bold, visionary, and remarkable.

Limits have been considered on visitors to Oregon’s Mount Hood Wilderness and Washington’s Alpine Lakes Wilderness, which are within easy reach of the Portland and Puget Sound metropolitan areas. In some cases, the Forest Service has contemplated visitor reductions as large as 60 and 90 percent. Such limits are already common on popular floating rivers including the Rogue and the Colorado.

The purposes and boundaries of Oregon’s Malheur National Wildlife Refuge can only be divined by examining at least a dozen acts of Congress, presidential actions, and administrative decisions.

Pelican Island in the Indian River Lagoon in Florida was the home to an extraordinary number of native birds, many of which were threatened by plume hunters meeting the hot market for feathers (and even whole birds) for women’s hats.

Without enough wilderness America will change. Democracy . . . must be fibred and vitalized by regular contact with outdoor growths—animals, trees, sun warmth and free skies—or it will dwindle and pale. —Walt Whitman

Following are seven examples of high-public-value BLM Zone 3 lands in western Oregon that should be reclassified or transferred. The parcels in question are shown on the map segments to the left of their descriptions. I’m confident that a similar analysis of BLM eastern Oregon lands will yield similar examples.

Given Oregon’s historically close ties to the timber industry, it is hard to imagine that a U.S. senator from Oregon could be a co-sponsor of the original legislation that became the Wilderness Act of 1964.

The Snake River in Hells Canyon would be dammed today if not for former Senator Bob Packwood (R-OR). The French Pete watershed would not have been returned to its rightful place in the Three Sisters Wilderness if not for Packwood.

Though we’ve burned through one-sixth of the current century, Congress has yet to enact any sweeping and bold public lands conservation legislation in the new millennium. There’s still time though, and a crying need.

One usually has to overcome an entrenched establishment of industry, locals, and government that doesn’t want things to change. Yet, conservationists proceed anyway, and if they are smart, clever, and persistent (with emphasis on the latter) enough, they do find success. It often takes a generation to change the world, or even a part of it.

Those in opposition to the preservation of wilderness, especially “small” wilderness will disparage it because it is small. If the source is someone who generally disdains wilderness of any size, their arguments may be dismissed.

Republican legislator, lawyer, chief justice, granger, sportsman, conservationist, explorer, and scholar John B. Waldo read and quoted Thoreau, Shakespeare, Emerson, Aurelius, Goethe, and Wordsworth. He made twenty-seven summer sojourns in Oregon’s Cascades.

With declining commodity industries and a growing outdoor recreation industry—as well as increased concern for watersheds, ecosystems, and native species—it’s time for a 21st-century management structure for the nation’s national forests.

The national park idea, the best idea we ever had, was inevitable as soon as Americans learned to confront the wild continent not with fear and cupidity but with delight, wonder, and awe. Image by: Hendrik Cornelissen @the_bracketeer