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Examine principles, always examine principles.

Why should the Federal government own lands in the west at all? On what Constitutional principle is such ownership being justified?

Where does the Constitution allow such ownership?

Just asking.

One last observation: The further we allow govenment to depart the bounds in the Constitution, the more expensive and the less efficient such government becomes.

The federal government uses Article IV, Section 3 to provide for its ownership of federal lands west of the Mississippi. "The Congress shall have Power to dispose of and make all needed Rules and Regulations respecting the Territory or other Property belonging to the United States...."

In actuality, this clause referred to the wastelands east of the Mississippi to which title was by the original 13 States to the federal government to sell in payment of war debt. Once they were disposed of, then the eastern States were considered on equal footing to the original. The federal government retained title to a few enclaves where exclusive federal jurisdiction remained - forts, arsenals, lighthouses...

This Constitutional clause was also used by Jefferson to legalize aquisition of Louisiana.

The problem was that Court have misapplied rulings made in connection with the eastern wastelands, to which title had been ceded to the federal government, with the "public lands" in the West. "Public lands" were public domain lands surveyed and ready for disposal into private hands. They were not owned by the (corporate) federal government. The feds only controlled the patenting process.

The patent was a tribunal judgement that the State law had determined the better right to the land, that there were no treaty obligations connected to the land and that aboriginal title had been extinguished. The patent is not a grant of land owned by the feds. All public lands should have been promptly disposed of or passed on to the People of the newly created States.

With FLPMA in 1976, the Congress declared that it would retain the remaining public lands that had not been reserved or withdrawn. In effect, they claimed federal title to these lands.

Personally, I think this was a breach of fiduciary responsibility to the people of the Western states. The
Western States are not on an equal footing with the original 13.