RULING ON WILD HORSES JUST SERVES BUREAUCRACY

The ruling and lingering controversy that inspired it could be compared to beating a dead horse, were that adage without irony. The 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Tuesday lifted an injunction that had prevented the National Park Service from removing a herd of about 20 wild horses that roam free in the Missouri Ozarks. It is tempting to regard this appellate decision as much ado about very little, but in fact it represents federal intrusion of the worst sort.

To summarize the background of this case: A herd of horses makes its home along the Current and Jacks Fork rivers, which are part of the Ozark National Scenic Riverways. The federal government (embodied by the U.S. Department of Interior, which manages the 65,000 acres of riverways property) cites a policy that calls for the protection of native resources through the expulsion of animal species not indigenous to the land. In fact, the horses are not native to the Ozark riverways area, but they have roamed those hills since the 1940s.

The federal government insisted in its case that the horses were not only in non-compliance with the policy (don't these animals know who they're dealing with?) but were also wreaking havoc ranging from trampled crops to soil erosion. For their part, the purportedly offended people of the Ozarks are fighting the federal government, wanting to leave the wild horses in place and their heritage intact. U.S. District Judge Stephen Limbaugh, who issued the injunction last June, agreed with those who live in the Ozarks. A panel of appellate judges voted 2-1 in siding with the Interior Department and lifting the injunction.

So, the horses must go. Why? The Ozark National Scenic Riverways is preserved so nature can take its course. In this instance, federal authorities are directing the course of nature. In the process, with the round-up of the wild horses, the National Park Service threatens to do more damage to this wilderness than the animals managed in their years of running free. Thus, the decree issued in a St. Louis courthouse reaches down to adversely affect the lives of people and animals in a rural part of Missouri, an unwanted federal intrusion that serves bureaucracy but not citizens.

U.S. Rep. Bill Emerson, in whose congressional district the horses wander, regarded Tuesday's ruling as "a travesty of justice," and he's not far from the mark. There are few places in Missouri more peaceful than the Ozark waterways, and the federal government has succeeded in making them a battleground. The ruling speaks more to federal domination than it does to the well-being of citizens. We believe the appellate decision was a bad one.