http://proliberty.com/observer/20010802.htm
This is one of the lies that, having been told often enough, is now believed to be true. We want to believe in the sanctity of our national parks, wilderness areas and forest lands. They are a wonderful public resource. However, the truth is, the federal government is constitutionally prohibited from owning this type of property within a state.
The constitutional facts of life
The founders of America drafted the United States Constitution to form a limited federal government. It was designed to take care of only those things which were truly our national business. The state governments or the people were to keep all other powers. Article One, Section 8, Clause 17, offers the only provision in the Federal Constitution for federal ownership of land. It provides for the creation of Washington, D.C. as the seat of the federal government and allows the federal government to purchase lands in a state with “...the consent of the legislature of the state in which the same shall be, for the erection of forts, magazines, arsenals, dockyards, and other needful buildings.”
This is the only kind of property that the federal government is empowered to own in a state. The federal government cannot own forest lands. Why? Because no such power has ever been delegated to it and the Tenth Amendment prohibits the federal government from assuming any power which has not been delegated to it by the Constitution: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people.” This is the first constitutional fact of life preventing federal public land ownership within a state
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Public lands are for the public and this needs to be litigated over and over by each state. A federal judge does not have the authority to make or enforce such a ruling based on a false premise.
But is Mt. Soledad a “national park” in the technical sense, like Yellowstone? It is called “Mt. Soledad Natural Park”. The Left’s argument is however, that specifics of the ownership do not matter because it is land owned by some level of government.