Posted on 08/03/2002 12:05:07 PM PDT by Action-America
by William Perry Pendley
August 1, 2002
In 1872, Congress enacted the General Mining Law, allowing miners to enter onto federal land, locate valuable mineral deposits, and then develop those minerals. Once claims were staked, they were inviolate against all others, except the United States, which could challenge their validity at any time. Miners had to perform annual assessment work or else the land was open to relocation by rival claimants as if no prior claim existed. However, if the original claimant resumed work before such relocation, the claim was preserved. Often called the “resumption doctrine,” this is the “statutory right to resume work.”
While the “right to resume work” protected claims against rival miners, did it apply to the United States? In 1930, the United States told the U.S. Supreme Court that it did not: claims were forfeited if a miner failed to perform assessment work, even if the miner resumed work before a challenge by the United States. The Supreme Court unanimously rejected that argument, emphasizing: “[I]t is…clear that [a miner] maintains his claim…by a resumption of work…. Such resumption does not restore a lost estate; it preserves an existing estate.” Thereafter, the United States challenged claims for lack of assessment work only during a lapse in the work; but the Supreme Court later rejected that too, ruling that there was no authority for it. In 1970, the Supreme Court backtracked slightly: the United States did have that authority. But the Supreme Court left its 1930 ruling standing: a miner maintained his claim if he resumed work before the United States challenged his claims.
Not surprisingly, given the frequent and consistent rulings of the Supreme Court affirming the rights of a miner to “preserve an existing [claim]” by resuming assessment work, the United States took the view, from 1930 on, that claims were invalid only if the United States instituted its challenge during a lapse in assessment work. Then in 1993, in Clinton’s first year, the United States reversed 63 years of official policy and rejected the rulings of the Supreme Court: the statutory right to resume work was dead; in its place was a regulation that automatically voided claims upon a lapse in assessment work.
Meanwhile, in 1917, four oil shale claims were located on 520 acres in Uintah County, Utah. In March 1989, the owner of the claims, Cliffs Synfuel Corporation, filed an application for title (patent) to those claims. In October 1992, the United States said Cliffs had complied with federal law and was entitled to a certificate ending its duty to perform assessment work. But in 1996, the United States declared the claims null and void because, during the 75 years the claims were held, there had been a lapse in assessment work, which the United States had never challenged. A federal district court reinstated the claims, holding, “the Supreme Court knows how to say a statute is invalid;” because it did not declare the statutory right to resume work invalid, that provision was still alive!
The Bush Administration appealed the decision to the Tenth Circuit. On May 6, 2002, lawyers from Bush’s Justice Department argued that 63 years of interpreting the mining law were irrelevant and the Supreme Court’s decisions, which had bound the federal government for nine presidencies, were wrong. A three judge panel, deferring to the federal government’s expertise, agreed: the claims were null and void. Cliffs asked the entire Tenth Circuit to rehear the case and will petition the Supreme Court if the Tenth Circuit fails to rectify its error. President Bush reportedly is seeking to restore stability and steadfastness to a Justice Department that had a reputation, during Clinton’s years, for scandal and schizophrenia. But which is worthy of Bush’s embrace: three Supreme Court rulings and the official policy of nine presidents spanning more than six decades, or a dubious regulation adopted because of the anti-mining zealotry of William Jefferson Clinton? Sadly, Bush chose the latter.
Each month, MSLF president and chief legal officer William Perry Pendley publishes his monthly column, Summary Judgment. A hard-hitting commentary on environmental, federal lands, natural resources, or private property rights issues, Summary Judgment is carried by newspapers, magazines, newsletters and other publications throughout the country. So topical are the issues addressed by Summary Judgment that they are often the focus of talk radio discussion for weeks after the column is sent out at the end of each month. Summary Judgment runs 650 words and may be reprinted so long as credit is given to William Perry Pendley and to Mountain States Legal Foundation. A glossy photograph of the author is available.
There is now, so much tinfoil, posted on FR, that all the magnets, in my house and the entire town I live in, are clinging to my house and screen. :-(
The reality is that their brand of "conservative" has never, in the history of this country been elected. Don't let them get you down they are the eternally Pi##ed off that can only be happy when sniping from the sidelines.
I have heard and read some of the speeches that Bush has given over the course of the last couple of months and they go counter to this.
Please, first, let us make sure that this is not a fake.
Just click on the source MSLF and it goes to the article......
CLIFFS SYNFUEL CORPORATION .. is the case that the author is exceprting from. Read it and you'll find that the Corp. failed to do the required work as specified in the Mineral Leasing Act in 1920 law for 46 years. The Administrative Law Judge hearing their request ignored that little tidbit and ruled for the Cliffs Snyfuel Corp... The Department of Interior file an appealed. It was reversed on appeal and the law applied as written.
If it's wrong then change the law.
That's what I said when I found him the first time. Check his last post: He's HTMLguy!!!
Ah! AmishDude! You've come to recognize that Achtung Amerika is a shill!
Friendly advice: Don't be misled by all the patriotic trappings on that site.
Ol' Achtung praises tax-deadbeats who have renounced their citizenship to avoid prosecution as "tax patriots".
Go AmishDude Go!!!
Come on, when a guy posts with rainbow colors, links his own website and generally acts like an arrogant goof, it's not hard to figure him out.
The particulars of his beliefs are nothing but a distraction anyway.
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