Desert Bill--a Messy Anticlimax

Enough is enough. In the hope of derailing the California Desert Protection Act in the fading days of the congressional session, a small band of Republican senators is engaged in yet another stalling tactic.

Eight years have passed since the bill was introduced. It has been compromised to meet almost every objection. It is favored by the vast majority of Californians and endorsed by nearly every newspaper in the state, and it passed both houses of Congress with bipartisan support. So why do a few Republicans want to kill it by preventing a conference from ironing out differences between Senate and House versions?

They say the bill, which would protect about 8 million acres of fragile desert, would overburden the already strapped National Park Service. But we suspect the real reason is different.

The bill’s chief sponsor in the Senate is Dianne Feinstein, a Democrat in a tough reelection race against Rep. Mike Huffington. Some Republicans want to deny her the right to tout passage of the act in the campaign’s final weeks.

The Senate leadership has now scheduled a cloture vote, possibly as early as today. Feinstein believes she has the 60 votes needed to shut off any filibuster and send the bill to conference. An alternative is a possible deal between Sen. J. Bennett Johnston (D-La.), chairman of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee, and the panel’s ranking Republican, Malcolm Wallop of Wyoming. Wallop would accept the bill only with certain amendments that would benefit his home state. Johnston would add a New Orleans jazz park and other goodies for Louisiana.

We oppose such last-minute pork-loading. All sides have had ample time to shape the bill. The chief price of cloture probably would be that Feinstein would have to accept an odious House-imposed provision making the East Mojave Scenic Area a preserve rather than a full park, thus allowing hunting.

This is a disgraceful, messy anticlimax to years of hard work. One does not have to be a Feinstein supporter to see that the act is an investment in preserving California’s natural heritage for posterity. The intolerable parliamentary guerrilla warfare being waged against this landmark legislation must come to an end.