Pete Domenici: “A third. So, look out where the rancher has 500 head. It is worth a third less this year than last year. With the…”

“A third. So, look out where the rancher has 500 head. It is worth a third less this year than last year. With the drought setting in, they are cutting back. So they do not have any great shakes for those who are worried about rich ranchers and those of us in the West who are representing them, representing rich ranchers. We are trying to represent a way of life. In northern New Mexico, hundreds and hundreds of Hispanic Americans, in the third and fourth generation, have small ranches with few, maybe 100, 200 head, and some far less, on their annual permit of head on the range. Frankly, this bill that is before us, contrary to everything that has been said, does not take away any rights from hunters and fishermen and those women who hunt and fish. We just repeated it over and over in the bill, that whatever their rights were, they remain. There are some who want us to resolve all the issues between the hunting-fishing population and the ranchers. There is always some kind of problem with the public domain, some kind of friction. So some would like it resolved in this bill to the satisfaction of one group or the other. I believe we leave it just where it was. It is other regulations that concern us. Before we are finished, we will elaborate to the Senators who have interest, and the American people who are interested, the long litany of new regulations that Secretary Babbitt would impose on the rangeland.”