So, Mt. McKinley is being officially renamed Denali. I have no particular interest in this as a political issue, but I’m interested in the legal wrangling over it. The Obama administration evidently believes they have the legal authority to rename the mountain, while some members of Congress say they do not. I’m interested in whether there is a clear legal answer to the question.
According to Wikipedia, the Alaska Legislature first asked the US Board of Geographical Names (BGN) to change the name from Mt. McKinley to Denali in 1975. Ohio Congressman Ralph Regula opposed the change and petitioned the BGN to deny the request. Wiki goes on:
After Regula retired, Ohio Representatives Betty Sutton and Tim Ryan continued this tactic.
In making the decision to proceed with the name change, the Obama administration is, as I understand it, relying on a 1947 law that states that the Secretary of the Interior, in consultation with the BGN, can decide on names of geographical features (cite).
Is there some other statute or precedent or legal thingy that resolves this apparent conflict? Among legal folks, is there a consensus as to whether the Obama administration did or did not have the legal authority to make the name change? To me it seems that at worst the BGN is violating its own internal policy (i.e., the policy saying they won’t change a name if it is subject to pending litigation). But since there was only a series of bills, but no law, requiring the name to stay the same, it doesn’t look like the BGN violated any act of Congress. But, I dunno. Anyone have the facts?
(Aside: And thus, today, I have devote more thought to that mountain than I have in the past couple of decades combined. It is beautiful!)
It seems to me that the BGN, which is a part of the Department of the Interior, and thus under the control of the Executive branch, can change its internal policies anytime it wants. Its policy for the last 40 years has been a courtesy to Congress, not a law.
In 1963 Lyndon Johnson renamed Cape Canaveral (the land mass in Florida where the missile base was built) as Cape Kennedy. People in Florida weren’t happy, but the name stuck for 10 years until the BGN changed it back. Neither change went through Congress.
You seem to have answered your own question. Based on the info provided, BGN simply made it a policy to defer to pending legislation. Such internal policies can be changed at any time. There is no apparent legal conflict here.
OK. That was my read on it too. But I thought maybe there was something I was missing. Ohio Representative Bob Gibbs called the action “constitutional overreach”, and Senator Rob Portman called it “yet another example of the President going around Congress” (cite). I know that “unconstitutional!” gets thrown around a lot. I was wondering if there was any grounds for the charge this time. Guess not! Next time, surely, though, the wolf will be there.
Pretty much just “there oughta be a law” grumbling. Ironically, from Congress. But it’s just petty parochial politics, with a dash of partisan poltroonery.
I lived in AK for 5 years. We used Mt. Denali and Mt. McKinley interchangeably with no confusion. I predict, despite the official name change, folks will continue to do that, legal name not withstanding.
It seems kinda petty that the Ohio reps are so hung up on this. It was renamed “Mt. McKinley” as an election stunt. President McKinley never even visited Alaska, much less the mountain.
That said, I guess I don’t really care. I don’t plan to ever go Mt. Whatever-you-call-it, altho I would like to take an Alaskan cruise someday,
It was informally named Mt. McKinley in 1896 by a gold prospector. It wasn’t formally named that until 16 years after McKinley’s death. Nobody bothered to ask Alaskans about it, but that was the norm.
Why not just throw Ohioans a bone and re-name something else after McKinley – There must be something around, currently having a name of no great attachment, that Ohioans could appreciate being named after McKinley.
Why not just throw Ohioans a bone and re-name something else after McKinley – There must be something around, currently having a name of no great attachment, that Ohioans could appreciate being named after McKinley.
We (US tax payers) have already given them more than bone when we paid to build the National McKinley Birthplace Memorial. If they want more McKinley memorials they should raise some money and build them on their own and let the rest of us go back to ignoring history.
It’s just (some) Ohio politicians. Ohioans, by and large, don’t care and are only vaguely aware that some dude named McSomething has a mountain named after him thousands of miles away.
It would be confusing to just say Denali, since we often went to Denali National Park so when referring to simply Denali we ment the park, when talking about the mountain located in the park we said Mt. Denali.
