On June 26, 1864, Charles B. Fox of the 37th Ohio wrote, “Mother, I hope those that stayed at home will enjoy our efforts of peace and one country.” The next day, Fox was to be killed on a battlefield in Georgia that now is in danger of being overrun by development.
As a historian having studied the Civil War for 32 years, I have uncovered beautiful letters home and given names to unidentified soldiers. I recently returned from Washington, where I talked with our Georgia congressional delegation about the importance of protecting historic Civil War battlefields and sites in Georgia.
Like everyone else, I know we need to put the government’s budget on a diet, and tough decisions have to be made. But investing in our history through a federal program that doesn’t come out of our tax dollars is a smart choice as Congress develops a budget for the next fiscal year.
Since 1965, that program, called the Land and Water Conservation Fund, or LWCF, has protected key Civil War battlefields and historic sites in Georgia, such as Kennesaw Mountain National Battlefield Park and Andersonville National Historic Site, and other important recreational lands such as the Chattahoochee National Recreational Area in Atlanta.
The LWCF isn’t financed by our taxes. Instead, the fund gets a portion of the fees collected from oil and gas companies when they lease federally managed areas in our offshore waters. Every year, $900 million of those fees is supposed to be put into this fund to protect our federal, state and local lands and waters. But that seldom happens. Instead, Congress diverts the money elsewhere, and the LWCF is consistently shortchanged.
Today, LWCF is in jeopardy once again. In fact, Congress recently slashed the program to only one-third of what it is supposed to get. Now, the House-passed budget plan says even that greatly reduced amount isn’t a deep enough cut and proposes to eliminate the fund altogether. Congress hasn’t yet made a final decision, and we still have the opportunity to protect this program that has done so much for our state.
This year, Kennesaw Mountain Park has the opportunity to purchase and protect some private land within this battlefield but needs LWCF funding. This 16-acre property was crossed by Union troops in Gen. Joseph Lightburn’s brigade to attack a small Confederate salient at Pigeon Hill. It is where Charles B. Fox and many others gave their lives.
Saving this property would protect the memory of men like Fox and preserve our collective heritage as Americans for present and future generations. But without LWCF funding, this land is likely to be developed, as tracts north and east of the site already have.
While there’s no doubt federal spending has to be reduced, not all cuts are equal. Wiping out LWCF, as now proposed in the House, will squander an opportunity to protect our state’s and nation’s treasured places. LWCF is the kind of program that should be encouraged.
I am grateful for our congressional delegation’s deep appreciation of our Civil War history, and I hope they will support LWCF funding in the budget.
Brad Quinlin, a Civil War historian from Suwanee, is the author of “Rest Brave Comrades Your Work is Done.”
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