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42 REFLECTIONS ON THE ACT statistics so often cited to show that, since Tellico Dam, there have been virtually no conflicts between endangered species needs and development desires. Political pressures and the necessity to accommodate at least some of them may well be inevitable in any program with regu- latory consequences. The danger inherent in such accommoda- tions, however, is that if they are made too easily and too often, they create a perception that the agency charged with adminis- tering the program is willing to abandon its basic duties to escape political heat. This perception, in turn, emboldens still others to pressure the agency for even more concessions. It is this dilemma that now confronts the Fish and Wildlife Service and the federal endangered species program. It is, at bottom, the reason why a handful of senators for three years blocked Senate consideration of legislation to reauthorize the Endangered Spe- cies Act over issues of no immediate importance to the vast majority of the Senate. The challenge for the endangered species program in its next fifteen years, and particularly during the current administra- tion, will be to restore the perception that decisions in the pro- gram are in fact being made on the basis of the scientific criteria that the law demands rather than in response to political pres- sures. To restore that perception, the Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration must be led by dedicated figures who are broadly experienced in the management and conservation of living resources, strong in their conviction that it is the job of these. agencies to base their decisions on the best scientific data available, determined to seek the increased budgetary resources needed for an effective endangered species program, and widely regarded as having unquestioned integrity. Today, the first member of a new generation of California con- dors sees a world of bright lights, human faces, and .cage bars. Whether it and others that may follow will ever again see a world of rugged mountains, distant horizons, and open skies depends upon how committed the stewards of the endangered species program are to achieving those ends. For the condor, that com- mitment appears to exist. For the success of the endangered spe- cies program, no less a commitment must be-made for the many other plants and animals whose very survival is at stake.