George Frampton, President Clinton's Assistant Secretary of Interior
for Fish and Wildlife and Parks, is the former president of the Wilderness
Society (1986-1993), a former partner in Rogovin, Huge and Lenzer (1976-1984),
a former law clerk to U.S. Supreme Court Justice Harry Blackmun, and former
special prosecutor on the Watergate Special Prosecution Force. He is also
a former fellow at a public interest law firm, the Center for Law and Social
Policy. Frampton has no formal environmental education, having received
a Masters in Economics degree from the London School of Economics and a
J.D. from Harvard Law School.
The Wilderness Society -- for which Frampton served as president -- traces
its roots to socialist movements. Robert Marshall, one of the founders of
the Wilderness Society, was a member of the Socialist Party of Norman Thomas
and an advocate of overthrowing the American form of government. Another
organization founder, Benton MacKay, was a member of the Socialist Party
of America, the party that nominated Eugene Debs for President in 1920.
Under the leadership of George Frampton, the Wilderness Society nearly doubled.
Its funding base also grew, with the group receiving grants from such corporate
giants as Archer Daniels Midland Corporation, an agricultural corporation
that the Society would presumably consider to be corporate polluter given
its dependence on pesticides and fertilizers. During Frampton's tenure,
the Wilderness Society was one of the major players in the battle in the
Pacific Northwest over the spotted owl, which ultimately led to the loss
of thousands of forest industry jobs. One of the Society's principal contributions
to that battle was producing a study showing that timber industry job losses
were due principally to automation and job experts. The group cooked the
books by only including large timber companies in its study -- those companies
that owned their own timber -- thus skewing the results.
Selected Frampton Quotes
"We ought to make the whole state [of Alaska] an historical park so
people can... see how folks thought in the 19th Century." - George
Frampton, speaking at an Earth Day press conference, April 21, 1992
"...A group of industries, principally mining logging and... ranching...
for decades have enjoyed enormous federal subsidies to develop and exploit
the public lands... We're going to help the environment... And they're fighting
back. If you had a license to loot the federal treasury, you'd be fighting
to keep it too." - George Frampton, speaking at an Earth Day press
conference, April 21, 1992
"[Some Americans] believe environmentalism has replaced Communism as
the number one enemy. They have fixed on environmentalism as the green phase
of international socialism." - George Frampton quoted in The New York
Times as cited in Trashing the Economy by Ron Arnold and Alan Gottlieb,
1993
"That kind of approach is at least a step or two to the right of James
Watt. We've spent the past two years building flexibility into the act,
and these radicals are ready to run that off the cliff." - George Frampton
quoted in The New Republic responding to a suggestion by Representative
Helen Chenoweth that rather than introduce wolves into Idaho wilderness
to control elk populations a hunting season be established, April 24, 1995
"Our only rational options are to reject privatization and commercial
exploitation of our precious public resources in favor of long-range planning,
careful stewardship and protection. We must not squander our heritage or
forsake our birthright." - George Frampton quoted in Wilderness, Summer
1988
Dossier Credibility Ranking
On a scale ranging from 0 to 10 measuring political science versus real
science, George Frampton scores a 10.0 for political science.
Version Date: February 28, 1996
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