John Dingell: “It was to depoliticize the approval of projects and to see to it that we had the information we needed.”

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Establishment of a refuge does not instantly make the Federal Government a steward of an area of land.

Only a piddling amount.

The goal Congress set then was unparalleled in all of history. Our country resolved to put an end to the decades--indeed, centuries--of neglect that had resulted in the extinction of the passenger pigeon and the Carolina parakeet, and the…