Replies

Since you’re a lawyer and I’m not, what is your opinion on this ruling and why:

http://openjurist.org/107/f3d/1314/united-states-v-gardner

“The claim by Gardners that it is the duty of the United States to hold public lands in trust for the formation of future states is founded on a case dealing with land acquired by the United States from the thirteen original states. In that case, Pollard’s Lessee v. Hagan, 44 U.S. (3 How.) 212, 11 L.Ed. 565 (1845), the Supreme Court discussed the extent of the United States’ authority over lands ceded to it from Virginia and Georgia to discharge debt incurred by those states during the Revolutionary War. The Court stated that the United States held this land in trust for the establishment of future states. Id. 44 U.S. (3 How.) at 222. Once those new states were established, the United States’ authority over the land would cease. Id. at 221-23. This decision was based on the terms of the cessions of the land from Virginia and Georgia to the United States. Before becoming a state, however, Nevada had no independent claim to sovereignty, unlike the original thirteen states. Therefore, the same reasoning is not applicable to this case, in which the federal government was the initial owner of the land from which the state of Nevada was later carved.
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Thus, as the United States has held title to the unappropriated public lands in Nevada since Mexico ceded the land to the United States in 1848, the land is the property of the United States. The United States Constitution provides in the Property Clause that Congress has the power “to dispose of and make all needful Rules and Regulations respecting the Territory or other Property belonging to the United States.” U.S. Const. art. IV, § 3, cl. 2. The Supreme Court has consistently recognized the expansiveness of this power, stating that “[t]he power over the public land thus entrusted to Congress is without limitations.” Kleppe v. New Mexico, 426 U.S. 529, 539, 96 S.Ct. 2285, 2291, 49 L.Ed.2d 34 (1976); United States v. San Francisco, 310 U.S. 16, 29, 60 S.Ct. 749, 756, 84 L.Ed. 1050 (1940). See also Alabama v. Texas, 347 U.S. 272, 273, 74 S.Ct. 481, 481-82, 98 L.Ed. 689 (1954); United States v. California, 332 U.S. 19, 27, 67 S.Ct. 1658, 1662-63, 91 L.Ed. 1889 (1947); Gibson v. Chouteau, 80 U.S. (13 Wall.) 92, 99, 20 L.Ed. 534 (1871); United States v. Gratiot, 39 U.S. (14 Pet.) 526, 537, 10 L.Ed. 573 (1840). Moreover, the Supreme Court has noted that Congress “may deal with [its] lands precisely as an ordinary individual may deal with his farming property. It may sell or withhold them from sale.” Light v. United States, 220 U.S. 523, 536, 31 S.Ct. 485, 488, 55 L.Ed. 570 (1911) (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). Indeed, the establishment of a forest reserve by Congress is a “right[ ] incident to proprietorship, to say nothing of the power of the United States as a sovereign over the property belonging to it.” Id. at 537, 31 S.Ct. at 488....”