The Rabbit Hole: The Most Important Conservation Act You’ve Never Heard Of

Editor’s Note: The stories within the federal courts are, at their core, about the human condition. A victim, a defendant, a prosecutor, a judge and a jury all come to the courts with their own preconceived notions and biases to examine a case and in many instances, to right a wrong. And, for sure, it sometimes makes for good theatre, but if done correctly, it also has the opportunity to produce a profound reflection on what things we value enough to protect as a society. That reflection extends well beyond human defendants. Long time Court Watch subscribers may notice that we have a soft spot for one federal statute: 18 U.S.C. 42. To the non-legal nerds, we mean the Lacey Act. If you’ve never heard of either, you’re likely not alone. But the more than century-old Act has had a profound impact on conservation efforts in the United States and around the world. In this week’s The Rabbit Hole, reporter Gabrielle Russon traces the history of the landmark law, its implementation, and the stories behind protecting snapping turtles, trees, lizards, eels, and quite a few bald eagles. -Seamus

The world-famous Gibson Guitars company once bought wood cut from trees in Africa and soon found itself in trouble in the United States because of a century-old law.

A German exporter shipped the company thousands of wood pieces worth $76,000 to manufacture guitar fingerboard blanks, federal court records said. The 2009 deal was tied to the black timber trade since the ebony wood was illegally harvested from Madagascar.

The U.S. federal government filed a criminal complaint against Gibson Guitars for violating the Lacey Act — the first federal wildlife law that’s left a long legacy of protections still strong today.

The law, on the books since 1900, bans possession or trafficking of illegally taken wildlife, fish or plants. The law applies to animals – alive or dead – and helps the federal government prosecute illegal hunters and animal traders while at the same time protecting native animals and plants from invasive species.

Over the years, people charged under the Lacey Act include an Iowa taxidermist selling rhinoceros horns, a Chinese national from New York labeling live turtles, snakes, and lizards as “toys” in boxes heading abroad and even a Netflix star. Bhagavan Antle, better known as “Doc” on “Tiger King,” who was sentenced to a year in prison last year for selling newborn endangered wildlife in violation of the Lacey Act and money laundering. He had pleaded guilty to a conspiracy to violate the Lacey Act.

The Lacey Act was passed during the Industrial Revolution at a time when the United States was building a railroad and in expansion mode. Yet the government “had the foresight to put in place and recognized the importance of conservation and ecological protections,” said Michigan State University College of Law adjunct professor Jeremy Orr who called the Lacey Act “ahead of its time.”

Orr’s specialty is environmental and civil rights law and he is also Earthjustice’s Director of Outreach and Partnerships. After the Lacey Act, the federal government eventually enacted even stronger protection — the better-known Endangered Species Act, Orr said. The Lacey Act is “considered the law that set the stage for the Endangered Species Act which most people are probably more familiar with,” Orr said. “They go hand-in-hand together.”

The Lacey Act also carries international implications so it acts as a deterrent and protects animals in the United States and internationally. “Not only can you not do this here (in the United States), we're not going to allow you to go do it outside of the country and bring it back here and reap the benefits of it,” Orr said.

Long before today’s invasive species nightmares, like Burmese pythons terrorizing the Everglades, U.S. farmers in the late 1800s grumbled about the European Sparrow, the European rabbit, stowaway mice coming from the Old World, Indian mongoose, and fruit bats from Australia. These new animals in the United States disrupted the food chain or ate crops, according to a journal article by U.S. Fish and Wildlife’s Susan Jewell in 2020. 

Fighting back against these new invasive species was part of the motivation behind the 1900 Lacey Act which originally banned importing foreign wild birds or mammals unless a permit was granted from the Secretary of Agriculture, Jewell said. 

“One hundred twenty years ago, the United States stood as having greater protection against the introduction of injurious mammals and birds than was experienced by any other country,” Jewell wrote in the Management of Biological Invasions journal. “Considering the time in history and the purpose of the law, this seemed to be effective at preventing invasions, because relatively few fishes, amphibians, reptiles, or invertebrates were being imported.”

The Act earned the name because it was filed by an Iowa lawmaker named John Lacey.

“John Lacey was a real pioneer, as were the behind-the-scenes biologists who brought these problems to his attention,” Jewell said, according to an article published by the government. The Lacey Act has changed over the decades. Some provisions have been removed while another major update made it stronger. A 2008 amendment added timber and illegally sourced plant materials to the protections which led to the Gibson Guitar criminal case.

Trees are being cut down in Madagascar, home of the lemurs, so the African country banned harvesting ebony and exporting unfinished ebony in 2006. The U.S. government said Gibson Guitars knew about the native laws because a Gibson employee traveled to the county in 2008 and was briefed on the rules during a nonprofit-led trip.