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To: NVDave

You are quite correct that the homesteading act was designed with eastern and midwestern lands in mind. That’s where almost all the congressmen who passed it were from and what they were familiar with.

The problem with the notion that the federal government retaining ownership of much land in Nevada after it became a state is that it just isn’t true. Most states had land still owned by the federal government after they became states. Above I’ve posted links to documentation of public land sales in the 20th century in MO and FL.

Here’s some from a single county in MS. Feds still selling off public land more than a century after statehood in 1817.

http://www.glorecords.blm.gov/results/default.aspx?searchCriteria=type=patent|st=MS|cty=019|sp=true|sw=true|sadv=false#resultsTabIndex=0&page=1&sortField=6&sortDir=1


26 posted on 04/21/2014 8:23:59 AM PDT by Sherman Logan
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To: Sherman Logan

Comparing the land disposal in eastern and midwestern states to the western states isn’t fruitful.

Those state records you’re pointing me at show disposals of piddly little parcels - “quarters of quarters” or 40 acres.

That, in those states that could grow tobacco was enough to live on.

In the western states which came into the union in the latter half of the 19th century, the policy out of DC became one against land disposal, and then only in split estates. It is far easier to get a mining claim in Nevada than to gain control of the surface rights. In those other states you mention, when you gained land, you gained it all. They usually didn’t have split estates.

In no other state does the US Government control such a large proportion of the overall land mass in the state as Nevada. Other western states were far smarter than Nevada was, because they reserved proportions of the state for state lands. Nevada didn’t do even than. For example, here in Wyoming, we have “state sections” where graziers pay the state of Wyoming for the grazing rights. This is used to fund schools in the surrounding county.

Then there’s a little tidbit that most people who have never lived, farmed/ranched/mined in Nevada don’t know: Several of the BLM offices in Nevada are “penalty duty” for DOI employees the DOI would like to make quit. When you’re dealing with the BLM on land disposal issues in Nevada, you have pure, simple stupidity standing in your way as well as the other factors.


27 posted on 04/21/2014 9:00:28 AM PDT by NVDave
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To: Sherman Logan; NVDave
There were federal lands for homesteading up until 1976.

All of conflict about Bundy is about FLPMA and FLPMA ended homesteading.

But there is still a lot of landswapping going on and if you need some BLM land, or Forest Service land, you go out and buy some private land that the land agency deems to be desirable and they will gladly swap with you. In my neck of the woods, for the last 25 years, Weyerhauser has been swapping with Forest Service, FWS, and state agencies in which Weyerhauser is trading away acres for board feet.

The money available to the land agencies to buy land is mostly from the Land and Water Conservation Fund(1965). And that act requires that 60% of the money appropriated be used to buy more land. For each forest and each BLM unit there is a lot competition for this money. Sometimes, Congress will make a special appropriation as they did in 2000(1 million) to buy the Baca #1 ranch in New Mexico to create the Valles Caldera, on which they lease grazing. They charge a tourist $10 per day to hike and a rancher 55 cents per day to graze one cow-calf unit.

28 posted on 04/21/2014 9:29:32 AM PDT by Ben Ficklin
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