How so?
Art. 1, Sect 8, Clause 17:To exercise exclusive Legislation in all Cases whatsoever, over such District (not exceeding ten Miles square) as may, by Cession of particular States, and the Acceptance of Congress, become the Seat of the Government of the United States, and to exercise like Authority over all Places purchased by the Consent of the Legislature of the State in which the Same shall be, for the Erection of Forts, Magazines, Arsenals, dock-Yards, and other needful Buildings
The federal government never ceded ownership of 80+% of the land in Nevada to the state. It retained ownership in violation of this article. The land belonged and still belongs to the state of Nevada. The local law enforcemnt authority is the SHERIFF. The BLM has no authority nor does the federal government since they didn’t comply when Nevada got staehood in 1860’s. The federal government never purchased the land from the state with the consent of the state legislature. That is the essence of it.
The clause, known as the Enclave Clause, authorizes Congress to purchase, own and control land in a state under specific and limited conditions, namely “for the erection of forts, magazines, arsenals, dockyards, and other needful buildings,” and not, as the feds now insist, to protect an endangered tortoise.
The Founders were opposed to providing a centralized federal government with unlimited authority to purchase and, as is routinely the case today, seize state and private land.
During the federal convention debates in September, 1787, Elbridge Gerry, who later went on to serve as vice president under James Madison, contended federal purchase of land “might be made use of to enslave any particular State by buying up its territory, and that the strongholds proposed would be a means of awing the State into an undue obedience.”
In order to make certain the federal government did not abuse the Enclave Clause, the words “Consent of the Legislature of the State” were added.
Madison, Jefferson and the Founders were primarily interested in limited government and the diffusion of federal authority over the states for the protection of individual liberty. In 1992, the Supreme Court issued an opinion on the framers’ reasoning behind the state consent requirement (New York v. U.S):
“The Constitution does not protect the sovereignty of States for the benefit of the States or state governments as abstract political entities, or even for the benefit of the public officials governing the States.
To the contrary, the Constitution divides authority between federal and state governments for the protection of individuals. State sovereignty is not just an end in itself: rather,federalism secures to citizens the liberties that derive from the diffusion of sovereign power.” (Emphasis added.)
Madison knew unlimited federal power inevitably results in unbridled tyranny. “I venture to declare it as my opinion that, were the power of Congress to be established in the latitude contended for, it would subvert the very foundations, and transmute the very nature of the limited government established by the people of America,” he wrote.
Despite the desire of the founders and the originating principles of the nation, conceived as a constitutional republic, the federal government has repeatedly and habitually exacted dictatorial authority in Nevada and throughout much of the West.
“The United States government owns and has broad authority to regulate federal lands in Nevada,” the BLM arrogantly insists. “In response to challenges of federal ownership of the lands in Nevada, the 9th circuit held that the federal government owned all federal lands in Nevada, and that those lands did not pass to the state upon statehood.”
This is in direct conflict with Article 1, Section 8, Clause 17 of the Constitution.