Backlash Against Big Oil

Anger at the industry helps an Alaska conservation bill

Tip O'Neill stood in his Speaker's office and waved a big hand toward the floor of the House. "The oil industry is in rough shape out there," he declared. "The members think they're voting against another rape by Big Oil."

Big Oil clearly was in trouble. By a vote of 268 to 157, the House had just approved a proposal that the industry thought it could defeat: legislation that would set aside 126 million acres of Alaska's most spectacular wilderness. The bill would place stringent limits on how the land could be developed by oil companies looking for new sources of petroleum, as well as by lumber and mining interests. The most sweeping land conservation legislation in U.S. history, the bill would preserve an area slightly larger than California. It would also protect the great caribou herds in the Arctic Wildlife Range, the spawning beds of the Pacific salmon in the Misty Fjords along the state's southeast coast, the nesting grounds of the dwindling numbers of American bald eagles on Admiralty Island and the habitat of the whistling swan in the southwest.

Before the vote, Congressman Mo Udall, one of the bill's sponsors, had feared the gasoline shortage would give industry lobbyists a powerful argument for approval of an opposing measure that would have opened 63 million acres of Alaska's wildlife refuges to oil exploration and hard-rock mining. With long lines forming outside California gas stations, Udall warned, "This is the worst time to bring this bill up."

But O'Neill sensed a different sentiment on the floor. He knew that members of the House had been blistered by their constituents for turning down President Carter's plan for stand-by gasoline rationing. The Speaker also realized that the voters were fed up with the oil companies. "I've never seen the public so mad," O'Neill told reporters. "You take away gasoline and you destroy the family. That's the way they feel." Indiana Democrat John Brademas saw another reason for the vote, urged along by persuasive conservationist lobbying: "There is a feeling of protecting the great natural legacy of Alaska. It's a triumph for the environmental ethic."

The bill was itself a compromise between the views of the developers and the strict conservationists. A total of 67 million acres would be designated as wilderness areas, in which little commercial activity is permitted. Still, the bill would permit oil companies to develop new sources of petroleum in 95% of the state's total area. The bill would also give concessions to certain established developers and open 22.5 million acres in the North Slope area west of Prudhoe Bay as a "national petroleum reserve" in which private companies could seek and produce oil.

Republican Don Young, the state's lone Congressman, called the bill "illegal and immoral" and "a terrible thing for the people of Alaska." Udall sharply disagreed, noting that the federal lands left untouched by the bill are "twice the size of California and can be used as they please by the 400,000 people of Alaska." Referring to the region covered by the bill, Udall added: "The 220 million people of America are entitled to the preservation of the last great areas of wild beauty in the U.S."

By threatening a filibuster, Alaska's Senator Mike Gravel was able to kill a less extensive proposal last year. Another fight looms: Gravel and Ted Stevens, Alaska's other Senator, oppose the House bill. At best, the Senate will not be voting for several months, by which time it could just be filibuster season again.

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