Stewardship, not transfer, needed on public lands

Two years ago, the Conference of Western Attorneys General initiated research into the legality and precedents of efforts to move federal lands from public ownership. Recently, they released their conclusions, which have been endorsed by a bipartisan group of attorneys general of 11 Western states, including Montana.

In a nutshell, they found that this current round of efforts to radically alter America’s century-old legacy of public land ownership has no legal basis in state or federal constitutional law. They soundly rebuked many of the legal arguments that have been put forth in the h...