I think it might not be the best thing for states to administer these lands, because states are easily controlled by a small group of rich elites. I just wonder then, what is the point of even having state boundaries and forming a state, if the federal government still owns 80% of the land in Nevada for instance? Is Nevada a state in concept only?
It just seems like a weird and unequal set up. The states have to request permission to become a state from the very entity that wants to keep most of their land. So they end up accepting draconian statements like the one in the Utah constitution. I'm sure you're right about the legal aspects, I just wonder if a more federal system of shared responsibility for these lands might be a better solution. One that protects the lands from greedy and irresponsible people in states and allows the states to push back against federal policy.
I'm not an expert in statehood or federalism or sovereignty, so I'm not sure I can answer or respond capably to all your comments and questions.
Many, many millions of acres went from federal control to private property after states like Utah and Nevada agreed to the conditions of statehood. The federal government did not want to keep it all. Much of the land that did not going into private ownership could not sustain viable economies--too dry, too mountainous, no mineral value, etc.
During the Reagan administration a "good neighbor" policy was attempted to do something like what you describe, a more cooperative state-federal relationship. Results were mixed, at best. And in certain respects, federal/shared responsibility exists on some issues (e.g., wildlife which is typically managed at the state level, although this can be complicated).
I think I know where you are coming from with some of your comments, but I don't think it is quite as stark as you make it (although knowing you, I also suspect you won't find all my answers satisfactory either!).
(Coincidentally, you've been on my mind a lot lately. So I'm glad to see your name here.)
Do you know how the lands were treated in the middle of the country versus in the West where the federal government kept a lot of it? Were the lands in the middle of the country that were given to Homesteaders degraded worse than the ones in the West? Or is that comparing apples and oranges?
Is juxtaposing the Homestead Act and the administration of the western public lands a good way to discuss different methods of dealing with public lands? I understand the distribution of public lands in the middle of the country through the homestead act as one model and the one that came later is the west as another model. Do you you think that is an accurate way to portray it?
It seems like you're saying that the lands that the federal government held onto were not very useful and so the states didn't really want them. Is that what you mean?
I guess I just have a knee-jerk negative reaction when I see the lands going to the federal government as the default. I understand the federal government had those lands before the states became states, but I don't think those lands should be retained by the federal government unless the states figured out a way to wrest them from the federal government. But I don't really know how it all happened. It seems fair to me that if the states want them, there should at least be an arrangement made to make the states and the federal government happy.
I think both levels of government have a point of view that would be useful for administering those lands. Or, create a system where the lands will be distributed to individuals and not end up in the hands of a few fat cats. (But this is another can of worms altogether isn't it)
Not to go on too long, (too late:) but the current development in Idaho is a good case in point. The federal government, (and some local businessmen) want to put a huge wind farm on public lands here in central Idaho. Nobody wants it, except the few people who stand to make money from it. Nobody can do anything about it. Senator Risch is reduced to begging the head of the BLM not to do in a Senate hearing. This doesn't seem right. We should have a say in what happens here.
The land law regime from the 1860s on was basically the same from Chicago to California when it came to the public domain. It isn't that the states didn't want land in those places; it's that individual citizens and corporations didn't find them useful (with current markets, technologies, ecological conditions, etc.). So they went unclaimed--although vast acreages were used and exploited by individuals and companies for decades without paying for them.
When conservation arose, additional values emerged that identified other purposes for those lands. That evolved over time, too. It went from saving trees for a timber famine and keeping pretty scenery to protecting habitat for endangered species and maintaining ecosystem services.
There was a time in the interwar period when the federal government toyed with giving the states these unclaimed lands but reserving subsurface mineral rights. This was purportedly because private ownership was best. But western states said, No thanks. Sen. Borah of Idaho said that was like giving states "an orange with the juice sucked out of it." The Utah governor pointed out that if Utah took over the public domain all that lay ahead was expensive range rehabilitation because of overgrazing for decades. (I think it's somewhat similar today. If some states got their way and took over management of all forests within their boundaries, one or two big wildfire years would likely bankrupt them.)
I don't know the current Idaho story, so I won't comment.
Sometimes the issues that animate the sides today are not the same as they were much earlier, but they look close enough if you don't really investigate that you can just impose the same arguments and positions back in time in appropriately.
What was the argument for keeping the mineral rights? I agree with Borah I think. The system is set up so that the Constitution is over the states and the federal government, but the federal government seems to treat the states like subdivisions of itself. Not as respected and separate entities inside of the federal system.
I never even thought about the cost of fire suppression and how small states out west couldn't administer the forests effectively just because of cost.
This is yet another example of how people have thought long and hard about, and struggled with these issues already.
It seems like sometimes the federal government is helping out the states in a benevolent way, but other times pushing them around or disregarding them. Do you see that? or does it seem pretty consistent over time?
That is kind of how it went during the Indian Wars. At one point the government would deal justly, and then later different people were running things and disregarded what came before.
I wonder how many things are actually novel and we've never dealt with them before and how many things have already been addressed and at least an attempt was made to deal with the issue?
I do not recall the argument about keeping subsurface rights. I think Borah's comment is clever...it also points to the fact that someone sucked the juice out already and that was widely observed and known.
I'm not sure I would use words like benevolence of pushing around in terms of federal-state relationships, although perhaps that's as good as any other set of terms. There are interests involved that are not identical and power involved that is not equal and a Constitution that is involved that is not simple. I think, too, that some issues remain clearly in one sphere or another while other issues blur. The blurring is where many of the greatest contests are.
Your final thought is a bit philosophical about the nature of history and change. And many cliches come to mind--the more things change, the more they stay the same; history doesn't repeat itself, but it rhymes, etc. The benefit of a historical education is hindsight, not foresight, though. Hindsight can provide wisdom and humility--something apparently in short supply.
Hypocrisy never stopped a good lawsuit.
I think it might not be the best thing for states to administer these lands, because states are easily controlled by a small group of rich elites. I just wonder then, what is the point of even having state boundaries and forming a state, if the federal government still owns 80% of the land in Nevada for instance? Is Nevada a state in concept only?
It just seems like a weird and unequal set up. The states have to request permission to become a state from the very entity that wants to keep most of their land. So they end up accepting draconian statements like the one in the Utah constitution. I'm sure you're right about the legal aspects, I just wonder if a more federal system of shared responsibility for these lands might be a better solution. One that protects the lands from greedy and irresponsible people in states and allows the states to push back against federal policy.
I'm not an expert in statehood or federalism or sovereignty, so I'm not sure I can answer or respond capably to all your comments and questions.
Many, many millions of acres went from federal control to private property after states like Utah and Nevada agreed to the conditions of statehood. The federal government did not want to keep it all. Much of the land that did not going into private ownership could not sustain viable economies--too dry, too mountainous, no mineral value, etc.
During the Reagan administration a "good neighbor" policy was attempted to do something like what you describe, a more cooperative state-federal relationship. Results were mixed, at best. And in certain respects, federal/shared responsibility exists on some issues (e.g., wildlife which is typically managed at the state level, although this can be complicated).
I think I know where you are coming from with some of your comments, but I don't think it is quite as stark as you make it (although knowing you, I also suspect you won't find all my answers satisfactory either!).
(Coincidentally, you've been on my mind a lot lately. So I'm glad to see your name here.)
Do you know how the lands were treated in the middle of the country versus in the West where the federal government kept a lot of it? Were the lands in the middle of the country that were given to Homesteaders degraded worse than the ones in the West? Or is that comparing apples and oranges?
Is juxtaposing the Homestead Act and the administration of the western public lands a good way to discuss different methods of dealing with public lands? I understand the distribution of public lands in the middle of the country through the homestead act as one model and the one that came later is the west as another model. Do you you think that is an accurate way to portray it?
It seems like you're saying that the lands that the federal government held onto were not very useful and so the states didn't really want them. Is that what you mean?
I guess I just have a knee-jerk negative reaction when I see the lands going to the federal government as the default. I understand the federal government had those lands before the states became states, but I don't think those lands should be retained by the federal government unless the states figured out a way to wrest them from the federal government. But I don't really know how it all happened. It seems fair to me that if the states want them, there should at least be an arrangement made to make the states and the federal government happy.
I think both levels of government have a point of view that would be useful for administering those lands. Or, create a system where the lands will be distributed to individuals and not end up in the hands of a few fat cats. (But this is another can of worms altogether isn't it)
Not to go on too long, (too late:) but the current development in Idaho is a good case in point. The federal government, (and some local businessmen) want to put a huge wind farm on public lands here in central Idaho. Nobody wants it, except the few people who stand to make money from it. Nobody can do anything about it. Senator Risch is reduced to begging the head of the BLM not to do in a Senate hearing. This doesn't seem right. We should have a say in what happens here.
The first two or three chapters of my last book (https://rowman.com/ISBN/9781442246959/Making-Americas-Public-Lands-The-Contested-History-of-Conservation-on-Federal-Lands) cover much of this. I encourage you to buy that and read carefully!
The land law regime from the 1860s on was basically the same from Chicago to California when it came to the public domain. It isn't that the states didn't want land in those places; it's that individual citizens and corporations didn't find them useful (with current markets, technologies, ecological conditions, etc.). So they went unclaimed--although vast acreages were used and exploited by individuals and companies for decades without paying for them.
When conservation arose, additional values emerged that identified other purposes for those lands. That evolved over time, too. It went from saving trees for a timber famine and keeping pretty scenery to protecting habitat for endangered species and maintaining ecosystem services.
There was a time in the interwar period when the federal government toyed with giving the states these unclaimed lands but reserving subsurface mineral rights. This was purportedly because private ownership was best. But western states said, No thanks. Sen. Borah of Idaho said that was like giving states "an orange with the juice sucked out of it." The Utah governor pointed out that if Utah took over the public domain all that lay ahead was expensive range rehabilitation because of overgrazing for decades. (I think it's somewhat similar today. If some states got their way and took over management of all forests within their boundaries, one or two big wildfire years would likely bankrupt them.)
I don't know the current Idaho story, so I won't comment.
Sometimes the issues that animate the sides today are not the same as they were much earlier, but they look close enough if you don't really investigate that you can just impose the same arguments and positions back in time in appropriately.
What was the argument for keeping the mineral rights? I agree with Borah I think. The system is set up so that the Constitution is over the states and the federal government, but the federal government seems to treat the states like subdivisions of itself. Not as respected and separate entities inside of the federal system.
I never even thought about the cost of fire suppression and how small states out west couldn't administer the forests effectively just because of cost.
This is yet another example of how people have thought long and hard about, and struggled with these issues already.
It seems like sometimes the federal government is helping out the states in a benevolent way, but other times pushing them around or disregarding them. Do you see that? or does it seem pretty consistent over time?
That is kind of how it went during the Indian Wars. At one point the government would deal justly, and then later different people were running things and disregarded what came before.
I wonder how many things are actually novel and we've never dealt with them before and how many things have already been addressed and at least an attempt was made to deal with the issue?
I do not recall the argument about keeping subsurface rights. I think Borah's comment is clever...it also points to the fact that someone sucked the juice out already and that was widely observed and known.
I'm not sure I would use words like benevolence of pushing around in terms of federal-state relationships, although perhaps that's as good as any other set of terms. There are interests involved that are not identical and power involved that is not equal and a Constitution that is involved that is not simple. I think, too, that some issues remain clearly in one sphere or another while other issues blur. The blurring is where many of the greatest contests are.
Your final thought is a bit philosophical about the nature of history and change. And many cliches come to mind--the more things change, the more they stay the same; history doesn't repeat itself, but it rhymes, etc. The benefit of a historical education is hindsight, not foresight, though. Hindsight can provide wisdom and humility--something apparently in short supply.