User:Kcahlber/Endangered Species Act of 1969

The Endangered Species Act of 1969
The Endangered Species Act of 1969 (Public Law 91-135) authorized the United States Secretary of the Interior to develop a list of species or subspecies of animals threatened with worldwide extinction and prohibited the importation from any foreign country of any such animal or any part, any product, or egg thereof. Limited exceptions for scientific, educational, zoological or propagational purposes and for certain cases of commercial "economic hardship" were allowed under strict permitting procedures.

The 1969 Act also amended existing laws to prohibit throughout the United States the sale or purchase by any person of any domestically endangered species or part or product thereof which was taken in any manner in violation of the laws or regulations of a State or foreign country. Finally, the 1969 Act authorized up to $15 million to be appropriated to acquire lands for the purpose of conserving, protecting, restoring, or propagating any endangered species.

Importance
Was the basis for what we now know as the Endangered Species Act. Only difference between the Endangered Species Act of 1969 and that of 1973 were minor adjustments in monetary and criminal punishments.

"Designated that there be two endangered species lists (one for species native to the U.S. and one for those native to other countries)."

"The 1969 Act extended protection to some invertebrates, increased prohibitions on illegal trade, and set the framework that would later be the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora."