I was listening to NPR's morning edition this past Tuesday, August 7th, and I noticed something odd during the broadcast. A story ran reporting the threat posed to Theodore Roosevelt's Badlands Ranch by the proposed construction of a bridge. At the conclusion of this discussion, which can be found here, the host mentioned that President Obama could utilize executive power to declare the Badlands Ranch a National Monument site, thereby protecting it from construction. When listing other presidents who have utilized executive action to protect natural sanctuaries, the host mentioned President Roosevelt, of course, and as a more recent example, listed President Clinton.
I find this mention of President Clinton interesting because the host did not mention the wildlife preservation efforts that President George W. Bush undertook during his time in office. Specifically, President Bush's designation of the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands Marine National Monument in June of 2006 comes to mind. Now named the Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument, President Bush was inspired to defend this region after watching a PBS documentary entitled Voyage to Kure, by Jean-Michel Cousteau. Under the Antiquities Act of 1906 passed by President Roosevelt, Bush declared the biologically diverse yet sensitive waters surrounding the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands protected from potential human harm.
While President Clinton certainly utilized the Antiquities Act more, with a grand total of 21 instances in which the Act was invoked, Clinton only protected 5,910,123 acres worth of land. This total pales in comparison to the amount of land repurposed as national monument space by President Bush, which including three sites in the Pacific Ocean, totals over 118 million acres. This amounts to almost a quarter of the near-530 million acre Louisiana Purchase, and encompasses significantly more land than President Clinton ever designated.