The Congress hereby finds that—

(1) proclamations by Presidents Herbert Hoover in 1933 and Franklin Roosevelt in 1937 established and expanded the Death Valley National Monument for the preservation of the unusual features of scenic, scientific, and educational interest therein contained;

(2) Death Valley National Monument is today recognized as a major unit of the National Park System, having extraordinary values enjoyed by millions of visitors;

(3) the monument boundaries established in the 1930’s exclude and thereby expose to incompatible development and inconsistent management, contiguous Federal lands of essential and superlative natural, ecological, geological, archeological, paleontological, cultural, historical ad ¹ wilderness values;

(4) Death Valley National Monument should be substantially enlarged by the addition of all contiguous Federal lands of national park caliber and afforded full recognition and statutory protection as a National Park; and

(5) the wilderness within Death Valley should receive maximum statutory protection by designation pursuant to the Wilderness Act [16 U.S.C. 1131 et seq.].