Political Quotes

“I wish to join several Senators who have come to the floor to talk about the Land and Water Conservation Fund. I know Senator Burr and Senator Daines have spoken, and I think there were several others who spoke about this very worthwhile program that has been on the books for a very long time. I come to the floor to say I support their effort. I support the idea that we should be able to get a unanimous consent request so that we can extend the Land and Water Conservation Fund. I thought I would talk first a little bit about the history because my father, Stewart Udall, was one of the people who actually worked with Congress to create the Land and Water Conservation Fund in the 1960s. He worked with Wilbur Mills in the House of Representatives and a number of other Members of Congress. The idea at the time was, here we had this resource--offshore oil--and we were taking a resource that was irreplaceable--the idea that once you use it, it is gone--and we were saying: Why don't we dedicate some of those resources to the permanent protection of land, of parks, for the American people? So that was the idea behind it, and it was endorsed by a nationwide commission of very distinguished Americans who said: We aren't keeping up with the amount of parks and other public lands that our growing population needs. We all knew that the American people loved their parks, and the same is true today.…”