Two property rights groups are challenging five new national monuments in court. The Mountain States Legal Foundation and the BlueRibbon Coalition claim that President Clinton exceeded his authority this year by protecting 1.5 million acres in Arizona, Colorado, Oregon, and Washington with monument status. William Perry Pendley of the foundation said that Clinton is only permitted by law to protect areas that are of historic, archaeological, or scientific value, but that the president “has no authority to close these areas because they are pretty, because they have endangered species habitat, because they have wild and scenic rivers, or because they have 800-year-old trees.”
