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AS HAS BEEN STRESSED areas admitted to the National Park System are accepted because of their outstanding-often unique qualities; also because they are of broad national significance. Hundreds of proposals for park establishment have been disapproved because the areas in question did not meet these specifications.

DEPARTMENT HAS CONSISTENTLY OPPOSED DAM AT GLACIER VIEW, Glacier National Park. Lovely Glacier View in Glacier National Park was saved from disfigurement when the Department supported the National Park Service in its opposition to a dam there, and the Department of the Army decided to eliminate the project from its program of development in the Columbia River Basin. The dam, if built, would have destroyed nearly 20,000 acres of exceptionally important wilderness, both scenically and as a habitat for whitetail deer, moose, elk, and beaver.

Yet, despite their national interest and other distinctive qualities, the wilderness national parks throughout their history have been periodically threatened with uses that are foreign to the basic concept of preservation and public enjoyment, and that would damage or destroy the very features park establishment was designed to protect.

In the first decade after the Yellowstone was made "a pleasuring-ground for the benefit and enjoyment of the people," efforts were made to have its most spectacular lands opened to private occupancy and exploitation. Large lakes, rivers, and waterfalls are constant targets of those seeking a cheap source of water for various purposes, although always another source so far has been available. Efforts continually are made to draw crowds, through what are called non-conforming uses (spectator sports and the like), that otherwise would not be interested in a national park visit.

During recent years the Department of the Interior has refused to open Joshua Tree National Monument to mining. It has sponsored legislation to protect the national parks and monuments from mineral operations except when the President of the United States, by Executive Order, shall determine that such use is necessary. It has reaffirmed its stand that grazing of cattle is out of place in national parks; and it has resisted withdrawal of land from Olympic National Park desired for lumbering. Pictorial examples follow of areas where the Department has resisted the rape of national parks.

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