In the Bozeman Daily Chronicle, July 3, 2000. Last month around Montana the U.S. Forest Service held public meetings on their proposal to prohibit road construction in the remaining unroaded areas of the national forests.
Many rural westerners are highly critical of the proposal.
Their protests echo the Indians Ghost Dance ceremonies of the late 1800s which attempted to bring back the buffalo. But unlike the bison, the best of these resources are gone for good. Further, the nation has become immensely wealthy and highly educated. And heightened environmental sensitivity accompanies wealth and education. Throughout the twentieth century the rural American West largely depended upon natural resource development.