[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 37, Number 3 (Monday, January 22, 2001)]
[Pages 149-150]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
 Proclamation 7396--Establishment of the Pompeys Pillar National 
Monument

 January 17, 2001

 By the President of the United States

 of America

 A Proclamation

    Pompeys Pillar National Monument is a massive sandstone outcrop that 
rises from an almost two-acre base on the banks of the Yellowstone River 
150 feet toward Montana's Big Sky, east of Billings. The monument's 
premier location at a natural ford in the Yellowstone River, and its 
geologic distinction as the only major sandstone formation in the area, 
have made Pompeys Pillar a celebrated landmark and outstanding 
observation point for more than eleven thousand years of human 
occupation. Hundreds of markings, petroglyphs, and inscriptions left by 
visitors have transformed this geologic phenomenon into a living journal 
of the American West.
    The monument's most notable visitor, Captain William Clark of the 
Lewis and Clark Expedition, arrived at Pompeys Pillar on July 25, 1806, 
on his return trip from the Pacific coast. Clark's journal recorded his 
stop at this ``remarkable rock'' with its ``extensive view in every 
direction.'' He described an idyllic landscape of grassy plains, snow-
capped mountains, and cliffs abutting the wandering river. Clark marked 
his presence by engraving his name and the date of his visit on the 
outcrop. This simple inscription is the only remaining physical evidence 
of Lewis and Clark's epic journey. In his journal, Clark named the rock 
Pompy's Tower, Pompy being Clark's nickname for Sacagawea's young son, 
Jean Baptiste Charbonneau, who was born at the expedition's winter camp 
at Fort Mandan on February 11, 1805. The name was changed to Pompeys 
Pillar by author Nicholas Biddle when his account of the Expedition was 
published in 1814.
    Ethnographic and archaeological evidence indicates that the Pillar 
was a place of ritual and religious activity. Hundreds of petroglyphs on 
the face of the rock, noted by Clark in his journal, reflect the 
importance of the monument to early peoples. The Crow people, the 
dominant residents of the region when Clark passed through, call the 
pillar the ``Mountain Lions Lodge'' in their language, and it figures 
prominently in Crow oral history. Pompeys Pillar also includes the 
markings and signature of a host of characters from the pioneer past, 
including fur trappers, Yellowstone River steamboat men, frontier army 
troops, railroad workers, missionaries, and early settlers. In 1873, 
Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer and his men camped at its 
base, where they came under attack from Sioux snipers.
    Section 2 of the Act of June 8, 1906 (34 Stat. 225, 16 U.S.C. 431), 
authorizes the President, in his discretion, to declare by public 
proclamation historic landmarks, historic and prehistoric structures, 
and other objects of historic or scientific interest that are situated 
upon the lands owned or controlled by the Government of the United 
States to be national monuments, and to reserve as a part thereof 
parcels of land, the limits of which in all cases shall be confined to 
the smallest area compatible with the proper care and management of the 
objects to be protected.
    Whereas it appears that it would be in the public interest to 
reserve such lands as a national monument to be known as the Pompeys 
Pillar National Monument:
    Now, Therefore, I, William J. Clinton, President of the United 
States of America, by the authority vested in me by section 2 of the Act 
of June 8, 1906 (34 Stat. 225, 16

[[Page 150]]

U.S.C. 431), do proclaim that there are hereby set apart and reserved as 
the Pompeys Pillar National Monument, for the purpose of protecting the 
objects identified above, all lands and interests in lands owned or 
controlled by the United States within the boundaries of the area 
described on the map entitled ''Pompeys Pillar National Monument'' 
attached to and forming a part of this proclamation. The Federal land 
and interests in land reserved consist of approximately 51 acres, which 
is the smallest area compatible with the proper care and management of 
the objects to be protected.
    All Federal lands and interests in lands within the boundaries of 
this monument are hereby appropriated and withdrawn from all forms of 
entry, location, selection, sale, or leasing or other disposition under 
the public land laws, including but not limited to withdrawal from 
location, entry, and patent under the mining laws, and from disposition 
under all laws relating to mineral and geothermal leasing.
    Lands and interests in lands within the proposed monument not owned 
by the United States shall be reserved as a part of the monument upon 
acquisition of title thereto by the United States.
    The Secretary of the Interior shall manage the monument through the 
Bureau of Land Management, pursuant to applicable legal authorities, to 
implement the purposes of this proclamation.
    The establishment of this monument is subject to any valid existing 
rights, including the mineral estate held by the United States in trust 
for the Crow Tribe.
    Nothing in this proclamation shall be deemed to enlarge or diminish 
the jurisdiction of the State of Montana with respect to fish and 
wildlife management.
    This proclamation does not reserve water as a matter of Federal law. 
Nothing in this reservation shall be construed as a relinquishment or 
reduction of any water use or rights reserved or appropriated by the 
United States on or before the date of this proclamation. The Secretary 
shall work with appropriate State authorities to ensure that any water 
resources needed for monument purposes are available.
    Nothing in this proclamation shall be deemed to revoke any existing 
withdrawal, reservation, or appropriation; however,the national monument 
shall be the dominant reservation. Warning is hereby given to all 
unauthorized persons not to appropriate, injure, destroy, or remove any 
feature of this monument and not to locate or settle upon any of the 
lands thereof.
    In Witness Whereof, I have hereunto set my hand this seventeenth day 
of January, in the year of our Lord two thousand one, and of the 
Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and twenty-
fifth.
                                            William J. Clinton

 [Filed with the Office of the Federal Register, 8:45 a.m., January 19, 
2001]

  Note:  This proclamation was published in the  Federal Register  on 
January 22.