East Moapa Valley, Mormon Mesa Restricted By BLM

Moapa Valley Progress ^ | April4, 2014 | VERNON ROBISON

[editor-surveyor]

>> “On what basis can he claim they owned the land prior to 1848?” <<

.
That isn’t the issue. Only that somebody owned it. That automatically excludes the Feds from any ownership.
.

[Sherman Logan]

What makes you think this land was in private ownership in 1848?

[editor-surveyor]

Almost all Spanish/Mexican land was in private ownership.

Here in California, literally all arable land was in private ownership at the time of the treaty. Likely the same prevailed in the rest of the treaty land.

Our constitution does prohibit federal ownership of anything but the listed reservations, like DC for example. So private ownership is the rule, rather than the exception.