By Lowell E. Baier with Christopher E. Segal

The Endangered Species Act of 1973 (ESA) is one of the most cherished and reviled laws ever passed. It mandates protection and preservation of all the nation’s species and biodiversity, whatever the cost. It has been a lightning rod for controversy and conflicts between industry/business and environmentalists.

The year 2023 marks the 50th anniversary of the ESA. It is also another year in an ongoing crisis of biodiversity loss, species extinctions, climate change, and natural disasters. Conservationist, legal and environmental historian, author, and attorney Lowell E. Baier brings to life the stark choice that now faces America and the world: act to save our vanishing natural world or risk the consequences.

This is not a hopeless choice. Through a combination of original research spanning the history of American wildlife conservation, including the last 50 years of the ESA and earlier; new research and bold proposals for the future of the ESA; and a year-long series of events, Baier is joined by over two dozen ESA scholars, practitioners, and policy experts with a bold vision for the future of the ESA and wildlife conservation in America.

By Lowell Baier  |  March 30, 2022

Environmental law expert Lowell E. Baier reveals how over centuries the federal government slowly preempted the states’ authority over managing their resident wildlife. Wildlife management today has become fraught with tension over the appropriate roles for federal, state, and private actors, who should be responsible for conservation, and how it should be funded. The book places these conflicts in their appropriate historiographic contexts, showing how they glacially emerged over time, and how the legislative, executive, and judicial branches of our government all contributed to the growing problem.

The book offers solutions as well, exploring how increased funding, partnerships rather than partisanship, and a renewed commitment to our federalist tradition offer the promise of a more secure future for our wildlife, and ourselves.

In this essential volume, Baier educates elected officials, wildlife students, and environmentalists in both the precedents that led to the current state of wildlife management, and how a constructive and collaborative environment can be fostered at all levels of government to improve our nation’s wildlife and biodiversity.

By Lowell E. Baier with Christopher E. Segal | March 10, 2020

In this practical handbook, Lowell E. Baier explores the best hope for successful conservation of America’s threatened, endangered, and at-risk wildlife – voluntary, cooperative partnerships that focus on private land, where over 75% of at-risk species can be found. Private landowners form the bedrock of these partnerships, and they have a long history of rising to meet the challenge of conservation. But they can’t do it alone.

This book is a guide for private landowners who want to conserve wildlife. Whether engaged in farming, ranching, forestry, mining, energy development, or another business, private working lands all have value as wildlife habitat, with the proper management and financial support. This book provides landowners and their partners with a roadmap to achieve conservation compatible with their financial and personal goals.

The book introduces the art and language of land management planning as well as regulatory compliance with laws such as the Endangered Species Act of 1973. It categorizes and explains the tools used by wildlife professionals to implement conservation on private lands. Moreover, it documents the multitude of federal, state, local, and private opportunities for landowners to find financial and technical assistance in managing wildlife, from working with a local NGO to accessing the nearly $6 billion per year available through the federal Farm Bill.

By Lowell E. Baier | March 17, 2020

In this book, Lowell Baier, one of America’s preeminent experts on environmental litigation, chronicles the century-long story of American natural resources management, focusing on litigation, citizen suits, and attorneys’ fees. He provides the first book-length comprehensive examination of the little-known 1980 Equal Access to Justice Act (EAJA), and its role in environmental litigation. Originally intended to support veterans, the disabled, and small businesses, EAJA, Baier argues, now paralyzes America’s public land management agencies. Baier introduces readers to the history of EAJA, examines the many beneficiaries of the law, describes in depth 20 of the most prominent litigious environmental groups in America, and recommends carefully tailored amendments to EAJA to correct environmental abuses of the law while protecting legitimate interests.

In 2019, at the urging of Baier and with his book and Congressional testimony as evidence, Congress responded by passing the John D. Dingell, Jr. Conservation, Management, and Recreation Act, which included an amendment to the Equal Access to Justice Act that has brought transparency to the law and restored part of the original intent of Congress to the law. Inside the Equal Access to Justice Act is a valuable resource for the environmental legal community, environmentalists, practitioners at all levels of government, and all readers interested in environmental policy and the modern administrative state.