This episode marks the one and only time we have seen the Cabinet Room throughout the duration of the series. The room is not to be mistaken with the Roosevelt Room that the West Wing staff use to hold their own meetings in the show. This can be seen by the different colored chairs used in the Cabinet Room scene. And note that the President (Martin Sheen)'s chair beside Vice President Hoynes (Tim Matheson) as he is seated is also raised slightly higher than the rest, this is in fact how the President's chair in the actual Cabinets Room is.
The Antiquities Act is an actual law officially named The Antiquities Act of 1906. It was signed into law by President Theodore Roosevelt and empowers the President to restrict the use of Federally owned land. However, the Antiquities Act only allows the President to create National Monuments, rather than National Parks, as suggested in this episode.
Bartlet (Martin Sheen) says of Cabinet meetings that he finds them to be a waste of time, but that Leo (John Spencer) "assures him that they are constitutionally required." In actual fact, the US Cabinet has no constitutional or legal basis, and is convened at the President's discretion.
In the opening scene President Bartlet (Martin Sheen) lists of places he's visited to Josh (Bradley Whitford). One of them is "Badlands." Martin Sheen starred in a movie called Badlands (1973) in 1973 with Sissy Spacek.
This episode was a 2001 WGA Award Nominee for Outstanding Achievement in Television Writing for Episodic Drama.