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Issues

Preface

The wild horse issue in the U.S. is an emotional one. No one doubts the beauty and symbolism of freedom that the wild horse personifies. However, their very success of thriving on the range has become a problem for them and for others who depend upon the range. Today, roundups across the West bring more and more wild horses off the range and into captivity. Some people fear that this symbol of freedom will disappear from the land. However, others are glad to know there are fewer wild horses drinking scarce water and eating what sparse feed there is available for livestock.

Since the passage of the Wild Free-Roaming Horse and Burro Act, the focus of wild horse policies has shifted from ensuring their survival from exploitation to determining how many and where they should remain. Currently, there are more wild horses living in government holding facilities than there are left wild on the range. Standing idle, lives unfinished, these captive mustangs await uncertain futures as the cost of feeding and maintaining them increasingly burdens our government.

The AMF strives to educate the public as to the complexities and implications of the issues surrounding today’s wild horses. With a greater knowledge of these issues, the public can make better decisions for their future.

An Overview of the Issues

In 1971, in response to public outcry over the threat to our nation’s wild horses, Congress unanimously passed the Wild Free-Roaming Horse and Burro Act, declaring that “wild horses and burros are living symbols of the historic and pioneer spirit of the West; that they contribute to the diversity of life forms within the Nation and enrich the lives of the American people; and that these horses and burros are fast disappearing from the American scene.” The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and the U.S. Forest Service (USFS) were appointed to implement the Act. Most herd management areas (HMAs) are under BLM jurisdiction.

The 1971 Wild Free-Roaming Horse and Burro Act mandated that wild horses be managed at their then-current population level, officially estimated by the BLM at 17,000 (three years later, BLM’s first census found over 42,000 horses). To the horses' detriment, both sides agreed to allow the government to manage wild horse populations at that “official” 1971 level. Eleven years later, a study by the National Academy of Sciences found BLM’s 1971 estimate to have been “undoubtedly low to an unknown, but perhaps substantial, degree,” given subsequent census results and taking into account the horses' growth rate and the number of horses since removed. But the damage had already been done; management levels had been etched in stone, and processes for removal of "excess" horses were well in place.

Fast-forward thirty years: in 2001, after decades of failed herd management policies, the BLM obtained a 50% increase in annual budget to $29 million for implementation of an aggressive removal campaign; in 2004, the 1971 Act was surreptitiously amended, without so much as a hearing or opportunity for public review, opening the door to the sale of thousands of wild horses to slaughter for human consumption abroad.

The current situation is the result of a long history of failed land use and management policies. In addition to being responsible for managing wild horses and burros, the BLM and the USFS are the primary agencies responsible for managing the nation’s public lands, including issuing public land grazing permits to cattle ranchers.  The public land rancher gets the benefit of public land forage at bargain rates. This current structure of grazing leases only serve to encourage public land ranchers to remove wild horses so that more livestock can be grazed. This is the number one reason wild horses are removed from public lands.

The fact is that the 1982 National Academy of Sciences report and two General Accounting Office reports have countered key points in BLM's premise for its current herd reduction campaign. These government-sanctioned documents concluded that: (i) horses reproduce at a much slower rate than BLM asserts, (ii) wild horse forage use remains a small fraction of cattle forage use on public ranges, (iii) “despite congressional direction, BLM did not base its removal of wild horses from federal rangeland on how many horses ranges could support,” and (iv) “BLM was making its removal decisions on the basis of an interest in reaching perceived historic population levels, or the recommendations of advisor groups largely composed of livestock permittees.”

From over 2 million in the 1800s, America’s wild horse population has dwindled to less than 25,000. There are now more wild horses in government holding pens than remain in the wild, with many of the remaining herds managed at population levels that do not guarantee their long-term survival. Still, the round-ups continue. No strategic plan to keep viable herds of wild horses on public lands was ever developed.

In the fall of 2008, the BLM announced that they were considering euthanizing nearly 30,000 wild horses it was holding in South Dakota, Kansas and Oklahoma and the Southwest. In February 2009, Representative Nick Rahall (D-WV), the ranking Democrat on the House Resources Committee (which oversees wild horse policy on federal lands), and Raul Grijalva (D-AZ) introduced H. R. 1018, Restore Our American Mustangs (ROAM) Act, along with Representative Ed Whitfield (R-KY) to overturn the Burns Amendment.

The ROAM Act would amend the Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act to revise provisions concerning the management of such animals.

More information on the ROAM Act can be found on the Library of Congress website.