Alaska Refuge Road

FILE - President Jimmy Carter holds up the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act, which declared 104 million acres in Alaska as national parks, wildlife refuges and other conservation categories, after signing it into law at a ceremony at the White House in Washington, on Dec. 2, 1980. Carter on Monday, May 9, 2022, took the unusual step of weighing in on a court case involving his landmark conservation act and a remote refuge in Alaska. Carter filed a amicus brief in the longstanding legal dispute over efforts to build a road through the refuge, worried that the latest decision to allow a gravel road to provide residents access to an all-weather airport for medical evacuations goes beyond this one case and could allow millions of acres (hectares) to be opened for "adverse development." (AP Photo, File)