Wilderness Tutorials

The United States was the first country in the world to define and designate wilderness areas through law. We act now to protect areas for our children and their grandchildren. We must keep Doug Scott’s caution in mind—“however much wilderness we in our own time choose to preserve by law, future generations will be more likely to judge that we protected too little than that we protected too much.” (Preface, The Enduring Wilderness, by Doug Scott). If we are savvy about wild lands, we can help preserve the remaining lands and look thoughtful in our grandchildren’s eyes.

There are many facets of Wilderness, such as what does Federal Wilderness designation really mean, how does an area become Wilderness, how does it benefit all of us, what happens after an area is recognized as Wilderness, what are the grave threats to wild lands, what are some of the misconceptions about Wilderness, and how do we protect areas that deserve to be Wilderness? These important questions about Wilderness are answered in our tutorials.

Let us know if you have other questions that should be addressed in this section. You can reach us at mwa@wildmontana.org.

Designating Wilderness: The founders of the Montana Wilderness Association worked on the original Wilderness Act and ensured that Montana had some of the first (and best) Wilderness areas.

How does an area become Wilderness: Wilderness is a National designation, so Congress must pass a law establishing a Wilderness area. Because Wilderness is created from lands held by the U.S. Government, and thus belong to all of us, Congress looks for agreement among many people and agencies as to which lands are suitable for Wilderness protection.

Benefits of Wilderness: The benefits of Wilderness are many, and for each of us, the benefits are unique. Wilderness reflects and preserves our values of freedom, personal and community health, preservation of traditions, economic stability, spiritual grounding and social activities.

Defending Existing Wilderness Areas: A Wilderness Designation provides permanent protection under the law, but there is no guarantee that the protection will be enforced on the ground. Thus, Montana Wilderness Association and many Montanans stay focused on maintaining the unique qualities of Wilderness Areas.

Threats to Wild Lands: There are 9 millions acres of publicly held, pristine wildlands in Montana that deserve the protection of Wilderness status. Sixty-five percent of that land is unprotected. A relatively small group of people and activities generate a daily immense threat to the Wilderness values represented by these wild lands.

Misconceptions about Wilderness: Because a Wilderness designation provides permanent protection for wild lands, we should ask good, hard questions about what it means. We should also be ready to debunk the negative exaggerations that are meant to sway people to oppose new Wilderness designations.

Preserving Potential Wilderness: There is only a finite amount of Montana land that qualifies for Wilderness protection. Thus, Montana Wilderness Association members work to preserve the wilderness qualities of all of Montana’s public lands, particularly those lands that are free of roads and other major development.