Does gov. make more $ from gasoline than Big Oil?

I don't doubt what you are saying, I just find that if you stick a shovel in "your" dirt, and find a lump of gold, that if the gold isn't really yours,than neither is your property.

Many owners find to their surprise that old Great-grandpa-Jones sold off those mineral rights to someone else (e.g., a mining company) generations ago. Or that when they "purchased a property" themselves, the mineral rights had already been severed and was owned separately, and what they bought (what the owner had available for sale) was only the surface rights.

Note, of course, that a lump of gold would also be different from petroleum. You could sink a well on your own property and pull in petroleum from under a neighbors, while gold mining would require that resource to be under your own property for you to get it.

And water rights are also somethihng separate. The east uses riparian water rights (English common law), while the west generally uses prior appropriation (from Spanish law). Similarly, many of the states that claim ownership of groundwater themselves are in the west.

So, actually, the west is less friendly to individual property owners, in a way.

Of course, the government is selling off land to mining companies at fractions of a penny on the dollar of its worth. Mining companies make out like bandits when dealing with the feds in many cases. It's an interesting field and I don't claim to be an expert.

Your explanation makes sense. I do see a substantial difference between great-grandpa selling the mineral rights, and a provincial government assuming them without compensation to the owner. Canada is doing very well, but they are starting to get greedy. While in some ways, they are allowing more drilling than the states (bigger place, fewer people), they charge substantially more for the rights to the point where the oil companies threaten to pull out (especially over the more expensive extractions, like shale oil). When the price drop comes, if it comes, the country will be in for a shock.

I didn’t know that the west (outside of the southern California area) had different water rules than the east . Here in prairie Illinois we have more water than we know what to what do with. Frankly, I do not believe that property values are absolute. I have never gotten a good answer from a libertarian when confronted with the question of someone damming up a river on his property, thus depriving all downstream of the water. Some protections have to be built in or a society cannot function. Of course, things get out of control very easily, and have at least since the progressive era if not earlier.

. I have never gotten a good answer from a libertarian when confronted with the question of someone damming up a river on his property, thus depriving all downstream of the water. Some protections have to be built in

A dam only stops water temporarily. Once filled, the flow continues as before. The dam just hoardes a bunch of it.

I live on a small river (trout stream where I live). I am digging a hole in the ground. It is filling with water... Is that not my right? I own the land on both sides!!!

There are other possible ways to put the question too. I suppose that someone could catch ALL the salmon swimming upstream on his portion of river. Or you could run a tannery and put stuff in the water, that makes it unusable downstream. All it would take is one enviro-wacko to own a piece of the Mississippi river or St. Lawrence Seaway to stop ALL barge traffic. etc.

One of first cases they teach in torts class in law school is Rylands v. Fletcher (1863). It had to do with a reservoir on private property over some old mine shafts. It is interesting to note that this case introduced the idea of strict liability (liability without negligence).

A dam only stops water temporarily. Once filled, the flow continues as before. The dam just hoardes a bunch of it.

Actually, that's not exactly true.

A dam allows greater infiltration (recharge of aquifers), and more evapotranspiration (loss to the atmosphere). It also traps sediment, not just water, meaning that downstream properties become sediment-starved unless they build a sediment trap of their own (without the sediment, erosion increases).

Plus, many dams are built to allow water use. Going back to the original point, a libertarian response might be that if the water is on the property, dammed up, it could be consumed by that property owner.

I am a libertarian conservative, not a libertarian, in large part because the natural world doesn't follow the nice rules we'd like, and individual actions can affect areas across boundaries and property lines. For example, the damage we are doing to aquifers now, by using water faster than it it is recharging (e.g., near Denver) is irreversible. Even if we were to cut back or try to artificially add water piped from elsewhere, the aquifer structure has collapsed.

Similarly, if we don't look at watershed-wide conditions, we are not behaving responsibly.

So I am a conservative...noting the "conserve" part in there, and realizing that being irresponsible and using our resources so rapidly is far from a conservative behavior.

...For example, the damage we are doing to aquifers now, by using water faster than it it is recharging (e.g., near Denver) is irreversible.

Bullshiite. The people can move, or make water from air.

Who gets the blame when a beaver makes a dam? Is a beaver dam any better, or is it that we lousy humans haven't any rights to our property?

I should be able to have a pig sty, or a dam! I pay my fealty taxes, yet I have no fourth amendment rights from a BUILDING inspector, who can levy fines and condemn my property. I haven't the right to keep a county tax assessor from my land. Anyone working for gum't, except a cop, can come onto my property without a warrant. Some of them abuse it as well.

This is no longer a free country. The constitution is clouded by socialists and their progeny. You sound like you may fit in, though you plead libertarian! Your explanation sounds just righteous enough!!!

I am learning about the law. I have learned that justice sometimes happens, but lawyers always get big checks! The courts are now crowded with social causes and class action suitors. It makes big awards become little settlements for the victims.

Motions, anyone? I have a few I'd like to make...

Bullshiite. The people can move, or make water from air.

LOL! You can change the laws of physics, eh? Do tell, oh wise one, how you have overcome the problem of hysteresis. And don't you think that those alternatives should be done before the Arapahoe goes unconfined?

Who gets the blame when a beaver makes a dam? Is a beaver dam any better, or is it that we lousy humans haven't any rights to our property?

Wonderful logic. Nature starts fires and they might burn down a house...therefore, I can start a fire that might impact your property.

Just because something occurs naturally doesn't make it something we should do.

I should be able to have a pig sty, or a dam!

As long as you impact nothing else, fine...but if I make poison gas upwind of you and release it to drift onto your property, I guess you wouldn't mind.

This is no longer a free country. The constitution is clouded by socialists and their progeny.

Agreed. You sound like you may fit in, though you plead libertarian! Your explanation sounds just righteous enough!!!

I plead libertarian as an adjective to conservative. As I said, I recognize that there's an objective reality in which we live, and I am adult enough to face it. One of those realities is that political boundaries don't constrain physical phenomena.

I pay my fealty taxes, yet I have no fourth amendment rights from a BUILDING inspector, who can levy fines and condemn my property. I haven't the right to keep a county tax assessor from my land. Anyone working for gum't, except a cop, can come onto my property without a warrant. Some of them abuse it as well.

As you pointed out, such a mess has been made of the Constitution. Part of your complaint is overreach, yet you argument relies on extra reach of the Constitution as more than just a restraint on the Federal government to restrict local ones.

Do you hear any complaint from me about your complaint about this issue? Nope.

I am learning about the law. I have learned that justice sometimes happens, but lawyers always get big checks!

Exactly right.

And I suggest that as long as people are pig-headed about resources and react rather than manage them, it will only get worse and we will see frustrated citizens turn to more socialist solutions.

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