The land is supposed to be privately owned. Not controlled by either a state or national government.

Theodore Roosevelt was president from 1901 to 1909. The National Park Service was created in 1916, though Congress locked up 5 areas of Federal land called "national parks" that TR signed into law. The National Parks are a small portion of Federal land ownership, not half the west.

Most of TR's Federal lock downs http://www.theodore-roosevelt.com/trenv.... were decreed as 18 National Monuments for preservation (some of which became National Parks much later) under the Antiquities Acts of 1906, and 150 National Forests under the Forest Reserve Act of 1891 before Congress limited the power of the President to decree new National Forests in 1907. It was a significant increase in presidential land decrees, but did not amount to anywhere near "half the west" and was not the root cause of the vast Federal land ownership.

TR signed into law the Antiquities Act in 1906 and the creation of the US National Forest Service in 1905, and he exploited them brutally, but the progressive agenda for permanent Federal control of the land was well established long before Theodore Roosevelt. The Organic Act creating the management of Forest Reserves passed in 1897. The original 1891 Forest Reserve Act had left the means and standards of management unspecified but granted the president the power to create forest reserves on Federal land (until 1907). The drive for permanent Federal control of the public lands began in the 1870s. It was mainly for government control of economic use, not the preservationism that became so sweeping long after TR. The 1897 Organic Act specified that forest reserves were "to improve and protect the forest within the reservation,... securing favorable conditions of water flows, and to furnish a continuous supply of timber for the use and necessities of citizens of the United States."

For a good history of the origins of the National Forest Service and the kind of statist intellectual mentality for permanent Federal control of land beginning in the late 19th century see The Origins of the National Forests, 1992, Harold Steen ed, which is a compilation of presentations at a 1991 conference on the centennial of the National Forest System.

Today most of the Federal lands are controlled by the Bureau of Land Management (about 250 million acres), not the National Forest Service or the National Park Service. Most Federal land and all BLM land is in the west, and is mostly land that was prevented from being settled in the late 1800s. There is a preservationist trend to restrict and prohibit economic use of all of it under the growing viro movement for eco-socialism, in contrast to the 19th century ordinary socialism, but none of this is because of five national parks signed into law by TR or an alleged decree by TR that 'half the west is owned by Washington DC'.

The National Park Service controls a relatively small portion of Federal lands but its impact should not be underestimated. It has been brutal in seizing private property under eminent domain beginning with mass condemnation displacing thousands of people at Shenandoah and the Smokey Mountains in the southeast in the 1930s. This has been nation-wide, not just in the west, and while it directly afflicts a minority of the population, when they go after _your_ land it's everything, and has impacted over a hundred thousand people.

I agree.
There are MANY places in Utah where I can't even get Sirius radio.
Hidden gulches abound.
Also, I like Douglas Pass in western Colorado near Rangely, CO.

Monument Valley is Navajo Nation.
This article alludes to Clinton's land grab of the Grand Escalate and making it the "first national park managed by the BLM".
I hope that the State of Utah is successful against Washington, DC.

... or mineral, air, and intellectual rights ...

Thanks. Already a Constitutional Libertarian (another Gulcher helping me to figure that out last month or so), I only learned about Ayn Rand due to the first Atlas Shrugged movie 3 or 4 years ago. Then somehow I stumbled into the Gulch.
I know I've sometimes acted like a loose cannon, but I've been learning a lot from you guys and gals.

Happened over a couple decades, but his national park grab started an avalanche.

Thanks for the specifics. Washington DC crossed my mind when it was too late to edit. Then I decided not to add anything on.
I knew TR founded some federal parks.
But half the west? Wow, I didn't know that!
I had assumed it was far more a gradual gobble over the years.

They made a very specific rule on Federal "property". Washington City and some forts and naval bases.That's pretty much it. Teddy R was the one that declared half of the western US to be the property of DC (a Progressive Republican).

Digging through my copy of the Constitution for Federal authority over livestock or any other animals aside from members of government I come up dry.

Jefferson wrote that we need a new revolution every 20 years or so (I think he used generation). We are long overdue but due to well over a century of government indoctrination I fear the likely result.

Utah has 43 State Parks already in existence for the very purpose of preserving cultural, archeological, and unique areas. They have shown the ability to do this even in the face of huge federal land grabs such as Grandstaircase/Kaiparowitts and others. I don't see calling what Utah and other western States are trying to do as land grabs is accurate in the face of the greatest land heist in history - that by the federal government.

But also, in addressing the perception of corruption, the original idea of keeping government as close as possible to the people was to ensure accountability and responsive behavior on locally elected officials. The federal retention of these lands creates an avenue for corruption and cronyism that is even further out of the hands of the Utah residents. But remember when complaining about corrupt elected legislatures - who put them there?

Even here in NE Nevada, I am currently seeing the TV ads by SUWA (Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance) where they trot out the cost of wildfires issue as being carried by the State should the State take over these lands. What they don't mention is the deplorable Land Management policies of the Feds that have created tinderboxes out of these lands. It's a near standing joke in the west that if you see an area blackened by recent fire - you can bet it is "federally managed" land. I remember in my years living in NE Wyoming - where land is dominantly private - when fires got going, and they have some hellaceous lightning in that part of the world, the County firefighters would be on the scene quickly and literally have it out in time for lunch.

I am no fan of the Federal Government but trust me when I tell you that the level of corruption and incompetence in the Utah Legislature makes the Fed look downright appealing. In the last two years, two Attorneys General have been indicted and convicted of bribery. Doesn't bode well for the future. My goal is to keep these lands out of the hands of those that would plunder them for the sort-term benefit of a select few. That is the crux of the problem. Utah WILL screw it up royally. and once they do there is no going back. For reference, please review the following:
Canyonlands
San Rafael Swell
Arches
Goblin Valley
Monument Valley
These are just a few of the lands that would be turned over to the corrupt Utah legislature. again, while I'm no fan of the Fed, there has to be a better way to administer the lands for the benefit of all.

The State of Utah has the right to screw up. It is land that should be owned by Utah and it is up to them what they do with it. I don't trust the Feds at all.

Yes! The Feds own or control over 80% of the land in Nevada. Why do they allow this?

Any other state, maybe. Utah, absolutely not.

That just says the state should sell off the lands when they get control of them. The Feds are still a much greater threat.

At the risk of riling up all the Gulchers here. I live in Southern Utah and this land grab is a horrendous idea. Utah legislators at every level have shown that they have no concept of preservation of unique lands for the benefit of all. If the Utah legislators get their way, you will find oil and gas drilling rigs leased to their cronies popping up in culturally and archeologically sensitive areas. Additionally, they have not thought about the costs of fire suppression now borne by the Feds.

The Feds will pull every trick in the book and then create more to stop this. The State of Nevada has Statutes on the books (NRS 321 series) passed in 1979-1980 in response to federal passage of FLPMA and the Carter regime empowered by it. What is called the Sagebrush Rebellion. These statutes maintain that the State has possession of the unappropriated public lands within the State. That led to a lawsuit called Nevada vs. US in 1981-1982 logically held in the Nevada Court System as the court of proper jurisdiction. NRS 321 left enforcement of the statutes to the Nevada AG. Then AG Democrat Richard Bryan promptly managed to see that the lawsuit was remanded to the federal court system where Nevada, of course, lost. Not only that, it was stipulated that Nevada can never try this again. Richard Bryan was awarded with a lucrative career as Nevada Governor and then Senator to DC.

Fast forward to Son of Sage heating up in 1993. Clinton and Babbitt were renewing the efforts to squeeze ranchers, miners, recreationalists off the public lands. The strategy had to be modified. Since Nevada ostensibly cannot sue the feds again over this particular ownership issue, we found a way to make the feds sue us. The Feds were attempting to assign a wilderness area to the core of the Toquima Range in central Nevada. An old toll road stage route (clearly state jurisdiction) had washed out in a flash flood and needed to be opened up again. With unanimous support from all 17 Nevada counties, on July 4th 1994, a county commissioner on a county owned dozer repaired the county road with a showing of hundreds of supporters. Two Forest Service employees showed up and one them claiming to be a Law Enforcement Officer held up a handwritten cardboard sign in front of the dozer and proceeded to run back and forth trying to stop the dozer like an environmental activist. The game plan was that if they try and arrest a Nye County official doing his duty, the fed employee would in turn be under citizens arrest as a citizen no different than anyone else, and thereby force the federal jurisdictional question. Which we knew they didn't have - the very Forest Service "law enforcement" employee had attempted to be deputized the week before by the County Sheriff! As expected, he could only act like an environmental activist and the road was successfully opened in the proposed wilderness area.

The gambit was entirely successful as well, as the feds (under Janet Reno) filed suit against Nye County in federal court in Vegas. This started a 2 year process of obfuscation, death threats, court room wranglings, pipe bombs planted with pointed fingers at "County Supremacists" (Harry Reid's words) and then a decision handed down in favor of the feds from the federal court system. Since then, the US vs Nye County case has been cited as proof of exclusive federal ownership of 87% of the State of Nevada.

Lessons learned? The court system will not decide anything along these lines in true constitutional judgement. As Jefferson wisely noted, there is a generational roughly 20 year cycle in visiting and revisiting tyranny and freedom issues. Here we are in 2014 with a fledgling grandson of Sage brewing in Nevada and in other western states.

The western states need to reflect on these lessons. Don't demand that the public lands be returned willingly by the feds to the proper State - take them back through Nullification of FLPMA.

" all Places purchased by the Consent of the Legislature of the State..." I've pointed this out to a dozen or so reps in my state of Wyoming and asked to see the receipts that the Feds have paid for all the BLM land they control (40+% of Wyoming). Believe it or not (I'll believe it when I see it) they say they are working on it. I also pointed out that it is embarrassing that any other state is doing more than Wyoming; get off their butts and DO IT!!!

They'll probably call it an "endangered species reserve with potential defense applications" once they get the Great Basin Rattlesnake, the Black Widow spider, the Hobo / Brown Recluse Spider, and the Arizona Bark Scorpion on the endangered species list.

Of course, that's alleging the current misadministration decides to take the (for them) unusual action of actually obeying the Constitution... Based on past and current performance, I wouldn't hold my breath on that one...

this is going to be a court battle for years to come. in the meantime will the people of Utah have or take use of the land?
i personally hope they do.

And I'd actually give them a chance at following through if they hadn't bought into Common Core. Idiot governor Butch Otter...

I'm sure our Founding Fathers would say that the federal government has no business owning land in any state.