A paper on the American enviromental movement in the 1900s

[Bakustra]

An introduction:
This was a research paper written for a 300-level History class on the Progressive Era; the period from 1890-1920, in other words. While this is primarily about the enviromental progressive movement, race, gender, and a little class and regionalism crept in, I would say inevitably, given that so many progressivisms became entwined during the period. I decided to post this because of a relative dearth of material on non-military and political history, and so I hope to remedy this in some small way with this paper. So, without further ado:

The Progressive Era was a time of immense change within American society. New ideas about the role of government and people in society formed and spread, leading to dramatic shifts throughout American society. Among the many movements of the time was environmental progressivism. The environmental progressives, as can be gathered from their name, focused on new ideas about the course of industrial and land development within the United States. Essential to understanding the environmental movement of the Progressive Era is the division of the movement into two camps; preservationists and conservationists, who were often at odds with one another over the purpose of the national parks and other preserves.

The conservationist movement was centered on the idea that the purpose of national parks and nature preserves was to ensure that those resources could be husbanded against overdevelopment by private business and later developed more wisely. This principle descended from both American and European experience with deforestation and its effects. George Perkins Marsh published, in 1864, Man and Nature; or, Physical Geography as Modified by Human Action, which was the first major environmental study of the effects of deforestation through history. This book led to the development of both forestry as an applied science and the first forest preserves, initiated by France in Mauritius and Great Britain in India.1

An example of the conservationist approach to the natural world can be seen in the practice of scientific forestry. This was a new field of applied science, derived from George Perkins Marsh’s ecological study of history and from the practical experience of the colonial powers in heavily forested areas like tropical India and the South Pacific islands.2 These studies revealed that deforestation leads to massive soil erosion, resulting in desertification as the topsoil is lost. At the same time, the introduction of steam-powered lumbering machinery required clear-cutting forests, where prior efforts would have left saplings and smaller mature trees alone. As a response to this, Europe began to develop ways to manage a forest to ensure that timber could be produced economically without destroying the forest proper. This became known as scientific forestry.3

Marsh himself was an American, and at the same time as he was writing Man and Nature, the westward expansion was leading to an even greater danger of deforestation. The westward expansion on the Great Plains led to many lumbering companies being contracted to clear-cut forested areas to produce more farmland.4 However, at the same time, more and more people were calling for the protection of the forests, particularly in watershed and recreational areas like the Adirondacks. Similarly, they called for (and Congress acquiesced) a law that would allow people to increase the size of their claims via planting trees to increase the tree cover of the Plains. The measure was a failure, but the roots of the conservationist conceit that nature can and should be managed and modified by humankind can be seen within it.5

Eventually, by 1890, the idea of protected forests became popular enough that 13 million acres of “forest reserves” were created. They would later be renamed “national forests”. The US Forest Service was founded to maintain these new reserves. Its first head, Gifford Pinchot, said this about forestry and its basic principles: “[Lumbermen] disregard the future yield altogether, and in consequence the forest loses its capital value, or may even be totally destroyed. Well managed forests, on the other hand, are made to yield their service always without endangering the future yield and usually to its great advantage. … Under various circumstances, then, a forest may yield its best return in protection, in wood, grass, or other forest products, in money, or in interest on the capital it represents. But whichever of these ways of using the forest may be chosen in any given case, the fundamental idea in forestry is that of perpetuation by wise use; …”6 Forestry, as can be seen by Pinchot’s summation, is built around the idea of making use of the forest, but doing so in such a way that the forest can last in perpetuity. Forestry, along with land reclamation, served as the most prominent causes of the conservation movement, especially in its earlier years.

Land reclamation was the efforts made to irrigate the arid parts of the West and Southwest. It was a concept that came both out of the conditions of the Southwest and West, and out of the reality that previous land law was ineffectual for dealing with the primarily arid land. The Jeffersonian 160 acres provided by the Homestead Act was too large for a single family to operate, and as a result, much of their land was grabbed up by the railroads, cattle barons, and other large corporations. Major John Wesley Powell, the leading figure in the effort to reclaim desert land, was a Civil War veteran and geologist who produced a report on the drier parts of the US that lead to his appointment as head of the US Geological Survey in 1879. His report stated that nearly forty percent of the Southwest could only become productive through irrigation and argued that only between one and three percent of the Southwest could actually be irrigated. He suggested that water serve as the fundamental organizing principle of the region, with land boundaries being based on the topography of the watersheds that civilization would be centered around, and divided into irrigation districts. Ultimately, Powell’s plan was unworkable because it relied on the settlers constructing irrigation ditches and impoundments themselves.7

The reclamation efforts continued, with the Newlands Reclamation Act of 1902, which tried to finance a massive irrigation effort by selling off the land still held by the government in the West. The Act resulted in the construction of more than 600 dams and thousands of miles of irrigation canals, delivering water to millions of acres of farmland and to millions of people “from Phoenix to Los Angeles to Spokane.”8 The Act failed, however, to finance itself fully, and was dependent on regular infusions of government cash to continue operation, though it would continue operations through the Cold War.9 Ultimately, though forestry succeeded in profitability and reclamation failed, both showcase the basic assumption of the conservationists: that natural resources should be developed, and used wisely, but ultimately used, rather than left alone.

Preservationists, by contrast, focused on the aesthetic aspects of nature. They argued that the purpose of national parks and forest preserves was to preserve nature for its own sake, rather than to preserve natural resources for later use. Their rationale for this was less unified than conservationists. Some, most prominently John Muir, felt that the “wilderness” had an essential spiritual and moral quality. Others argued that the wilderness was essentially for preserving the frontier identity of Americans and the virility of American men. Regardless of individual reasoning, however, preservationists focused on preserving nature permanently through the national parks and forest preserves.10

The preservationist rationale of the wilderness being important for American identity and virility bears further study. The wilderness was also considered to reinforce female identity and femininity as well. However, many women found the wilderness to be liberating from the conventions of the day and traditional strictures of femininity.11 Ultimately, the idea of the wilderness being bound up in American identity and virility lead to the demonization of individuals who were seen as harming the wilderness, and condemnation of using the wilderness for matters so pedestrian as hunting for food, rather than for sport.12 Similarly, the conflation of “wilderness” with “American” led to the eviction of Native American tribes from Yosemite, Glacier, and Yellowstone national parks, as well as the presumption that the Mexican-descended inhabitants of the Southwest were less “worthy” of the land than white Americans.13

Women’s role within the environmental progressive movement was fairly complex. Women supported the environmental movement through personal action, as “foot soldiers”, so to speak, and even contributed various leaders of the early environmental movements, but were excluded from the leadership of the conservation and preservation movements. Female leaders were almost entirely confined to urban environmental reform, which was seen as part and parcel of the traditional ideas of femininity that still held way.14 However, women still were cultivated heavily by both preservationists and conservationists. In the end, the majority of women favored the preservationists over the conservationists, which ultimately led to Pinchot ending any efforts to gain the support of women’s groups for the Forest Service.15

Women’s role within the environmental movement becomes more complex when considering the fluidity of conservationists and preservationists. The two groups were never truly monolithic, and many people held a mix of views, such as Teddy Roosevelt. Even the most prominent members of the two groups, Gifford Pinchot for the conservationists and John Muir for the preservationists, were personal friends and maintained close relations until shortly before Muir’s death. Muir himself personally supported the use of national forests as a source of lumber, arguing that the approach of the Forest Service was preferable by far to “the chaos which had come before.”16

As time went on, the differences between the groups became more pronounced. The differences came to a head over the matter of the Hetch-Hetchy dam in California. It was this issue that led to the conservationist dominance within the US government for the next thirty years, the shutting-out of women and women’s groups from the American Forestry Association and the Forest Service, John Muir’s final break with Roosevelt and Pinchot, as well as his final cause before his death, and which revealed the true extent of the changes in the way Americans thought about the natural world.17

The Hetch-Hetchy dam, coming at the tail end of the public debate between conservationists and preservationists, and towards the end of the Progressive Era as a whole, serves well as a case study of the preservationists and conservationists. The two movements clashed openly and publicly. Their beliefs about the role of the national parks and natural areas in general became exemplified by the debate. Women themselves were at their most prominent within the environmental movements during the debate, and it was this debate that led to a shift in the “proper” role of women within the debate, as they were marginalized and forced out of the public eye.18

The Hetch-Hetchy Valley lies in California, precisely one valley over from Yosemite Valley proper. The Tuolomne River ran through the valley before completion of the dam. The valley itself was quite similar, geologically and aesthetically, to Yosemite, and lay within the National Park’s borders. San Francisco, the nearest large city, had a perpetual shortage of water. The 1906 earthquake that leveled the city only highlighted the pressing need for a reliable water source in wake of the lack of sanitary drinking water following the quake. The city officials began to petition for a dam across the Tuolomne River. Hetch-Hetchy, with its high walls and relatively short distance from San Francisco, would serve as an ideal reservoir for fresh water. They quickly gained the support of the people of San Francisco, and petitioned for the right to build said dam in 1908.19

The new Secretary of the Interior, James R. Garfield, approved the request. This brought about an immediate movement by John Muir and Robert Underwood Johnson, the editor of Century magazine and a fellow prominent preservationist, to stop the dam and preserve Hetch-Hetchy, pure and pristine. Their campaign would continue for five years and lay bare the new opinions Americans held about the natural world.20

One example of the conservationist viewpoint in the case of the Hetch-Hetchy Dam is Secretary of the Interior Garfield’s justification for allowing the dam to be built. “[The] words ‘the public interest’ should not be confined merely to the public interest in the Yosemite National Park for use as a park only, but rather the broader public interest which requires these reservoir sites to be utilized for the highest good to the greatest number of people”.21 The conservationist viewpoint, then, was that the benefits of the dam outweighed the benefits of leaving Hetch-Hetchy Valley the way it was. The dam was first proposed as a means to provide San Francisco with a better supply of fresh water, one which, in the hopes of senators such as William Kent, would not be under the control of private enterprises.22 The preservationists, of course, had their own opinion on whether the benefits of a dammed reservoir really outweighed the benefits of an open valley floor.

One such example of the preservationist viewpoint comes from John Muir himself, who wrote about the valley itself in a pamphlet put out by a San Francisco society opposing the dam. “It is impossible to overestimate the value of wild mountains and mountain temples. They are the greatest of our natural resources. God’s best gifts, but none, however, high and holy, is beyond the reach of the spoilers. These temple destroyers, devotees of ravaging commercialism, seem to have a perfect contempt for Nature, and instead of lifting their eyes to the mountains, lift them to dams and town skyscrapers. Dam Hetch-Hetchy! As well dam for water-tanks the people’s cathedrals and churches, for no holier temple has ever been consecrated by the heart of man…”23 Muir’s words sum up well the three thrusts of the preservationist argument against the dam. Firstly, they argued that the beauty of the park was worth preserving for the public eye and the nature lover. Secondly, they called on people to oppose “ravaging commercialism” and thirdly, characterized the proponents of the dam as “destroyers” and “spoilers” who sought to open up the national parks for development. Though Muir wrote propagandistically and florally, his concerns about the precedent of developing the national parks were very real.24

The preservationists won a great many supporters across the nation. The New York Times itself weighed in on the matter, coming down in favor of the preservationists. In a series of editorials published in 1913, the Times attacked the proponents of the dam, suggesting firstly that Hetch-Hetchy was not as essential as the city said it was, citing an alternate report on the Mokelumne river and watershed performed in the previous year, which could provide “between 280,000,000 and 430,000,000 gallons daily, the larger amount if certain extinguishable rights are disposed of.” Secondarily, they accused the proponents of the bill and dam as having ulterior motives at play, claiming the dam to have been “presented to Congress with persistence and serious misrepresentation.” They went further in classifying the whole project as “a sordid scheme to obtain electric power” and claimed that the Public Lands Committees in the House and Senate, being composed primarily of Westerners, “have a natural and proper bias in favor of the local use of the forest reserves, and who apply this theory illogically to the local parks.”25 The paper also argued that it was a moral right of the world to demand that the park remain undeveloped, citing the original act while doing so, and arguing that the lake and dam would ruin the “unique beauty of the valley”.26 With this it can be seen the change in people’s overall view of nature and the natural world. Major newspapers like the New York Times had adopted the arguments of Muir and the other preservationists. Indeed, the preservationist campaign was by far the more popular.

Women in particular campaigned heavily for the preservationists. This, however, lead to attacks on the preservationists. Conservationists declared their opponents to be comprised of “short-haired women and long-haired men,” accused the preservationists of being “dupes of the private utility companies", and claimed their opponents were too sentimental, leading to them banning women entirely from participating in the AFA. Muir’s language meant many of his traditional allies in politics abandoned him. Senator William Kent, who created a national monument in honor of Muir, nevertheless noted that “Muir was ‘a man entirely without social sense. For him, it is me and God and the rock where God put it. And that is the end of the story.’”27 The debate itself was split geographically. Southerners and Westerners tended to support the dam, while Northeasterners, and New Englanders specifically, fervently opposed the dam.28

Ultimately, the preservationists lost. The Raker Act, as the final legislation was known as, passed the House and Senate easily in 1913. Congress had proven unswayed by the arguments of Muir and his preservationists, accepting instead the conservationist stance. Johnson appealed directly to the president to veto the bill, but Woodrow Wilson signed it into law in December. The dam would be built, although the actual construction would not be completed until 1934. However, though the preservationists lost over Hetch-Hetchy, the mere fact that there had been an argument showed the sea change in American views of nature. Furthermore, people on both sides of the debate argued that they would prefer to preserve wilderness, again showing an enormous change in American attitudes. The debate ultimately set the precedent of the national park system remaining off-limits to development by default, with exceptions needing to be made for any development. In the short term, however, the conservationist viewpoint would continue to dominate within the US government, and especially within the Department of the Interior and the National Park Service.29

Endnotes/Citations

1Wellock, Preserving the Nation, 5, 22-24.
2Wellock, 22-25
3Magoc, Environmental Issues in American History, 55, and Wellock, 23-24.
4Petulla, American Environmental History, 221-222.
5Magoc, 57.
6Pinchot, A Primer of Forestry: Part II—Practical Forestry, in Magoc, 65-66.
7Magoc, 109-110.
8Magoc, 111.
9Magoc, 111-112, and Andrews, Managing the Environment, Managing Ourselves, 141-142.
10Wellock, 5, and Fox, John Muir and His Legacy, 45.
11Wellock, 49-51.
12Wellock, 45-48, 51-53.
13Wellock, 58-60.
14Wellock, 69.
15Wellock, 65.
16Wellock, 61.
17Wellock, 65.
18Wellock, 63-65.
19Magoc, 129.
20Magoc, 129-131.
21Garfield, Decisions… in Magoc, 136.
22Garfield, in Magoc, 136, Magoc, 129-131, and Wellock, 62-63.
23Muir, “The Endangered Valley: The Hetch-Hetchy Valley in Yosemite National Park” in Magoc, 133-134.
24Muir, in Magoc, 133-134 and Magoc, 130-131.
25The New York Times Opposes the Proposal to Dam the Hetch-Hetchy Valley, in Magoc, 138-139.
26The New York Times…, in Magoc, 140.
27Wellock, 63.
28Wellock, 63.
29Wellock, 64-65 and Magoc, 131-132.

Sources

Andrews, Chard N. L. Managing the Environment, Managing Ourselves. 2nd Ed. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2006. Print.

Fox, Stephen. John Muir and His Legacy. Boston: Little, Brown, and Company, 1981. Print.

Magoc, Chris J., ed. Environmental Issues in American History. Westport: Greenwood Press, 2006. Print.

Garfield, James R. Decisions of the Department of the Interior … June 1, 1907-June 30, 1908. Magoc, 135-138. Print.

Hitchcock, E. A. Let Everyone Help to Save the Famous Hetch-Hetchy Valley, and Stop the Commercial Destruction Which Threatens Our National Parks. Magoc 135. Print.

Muir, John. “The Endangered Valley: The Hetch-Hetchy Valley in Yosemite National Park”. Magoc 133-134. Print.

The New York Times Opposes the Proposal to Dam the Hetch-Hetchy Valley. Magoc 138-140. Print.

Petulla, Joseph M.. American Environmental History: the exploitation and conservation of natural resources. San Francisco: Boyd & Fraser Pub. Co., 1977. Print.

Pinchot, Gifford. A Primer of Forestry: Part II – Practical Forestry. Magoc 64-66. Print.

Wellock, Thomas R. Preserving the Nation: The Conservation and Environmental Movements, 1870-2000. Wheeling: Harlan Davidson, 2007. Print.


Thoughts? Criticisms? Questions?