Every few years, we get a spike in stories about how the Federal Government controls vast swathes of land in supposedly sovereign states. This control, exerted as part of the Federal Land Policy and Management Act, prevents states from utilizing their own land, and Utah has had enough of that.
Utah’s lawsuit contends that the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) does not have the authority to effectively hold “unappropriated” state lands indefinitely under the Federal Land Policy and Management Act (FLPMA), the state announced. The federal government controls about 18.5 million acres of “unappropriated” Utah land under the FLPMA, and Utah’s suit argues that the state ought to control this land because nothing in the Constitution expressly permits the federal government to do so instead.
In the context of federal lands, “appropriated” land is that which has been designated for specific purposes like military use or to serve as a national park, for example, according to the state of Utah. By comparison, “unappropriated” territory is essentially land that the federal government is controlling “without formally reserving it for any designated purpose.”
Utah isn’t questioning parks, military bases, or other reasonable uses. It’s the vast quantity of real estate scooped up for no reason or no good reason. Land it would put to other use, protecting some, developing others. And the Feds are probably holding it (at this point) to one day pollute it with wind or solar farms. That green energy transition will require vase stretches of land set aside as protected for that purpose. However, Utah might not want that, or it might like it now, but as long as BLM can lay claim to it (both BLMs are money laundering operations), it can’t do diddly.
Given a chance, I’d expect most other Western states to sign on, with a higher-than-usual probability that this Supreme Court will agree. And if it does, the feds might have to give up their claim to millions of acres in any number of states, which they could then protect or develop as they saw fit.
I hope the Court takes the case and wins. Talk about a huge win for state soverignty.
