In a direct and dispositive conclusion a three judge panel of the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver has denied claims by welfare rancher, Kit Laney and his Diamond Bar Ranch, that the Forest Service illegally denied him a grazing permit on the Diamond Bar Allotment located on over 140,000 acres of the Aldo Leopold and Gila Wilderness Areas in southwestern New Mexico on lands administered by the Gila National Forest.
The Federal Circuit Court affirmed the New Mexico District Court decision which had denied that Laney held any vested property rights in these lands through his holding of New Mexico water rights or for any other reason!
This decision will continue the national trend of long-term reductions of permitted livestock use of public lands and undermines ( perhaps permanently) any claims welfare ranchers have to a vested "property right" to continue public lands ranching activities. Private banks and the Federal Land Bank system will undoubtably be more cautious in loaning operating and mortgage funds to ranchers whose grazing permits lack any direct property tenure rights on public lands. This decision will assist in the ongoing economic destabilization of public lands ranching so necessary to returning abused public lands in the west to a semblance of ecological health.
Here is the conclusion of the 10th Circuit panel:
Conclusion
Plaintiffs do not now hold and have never held a vested private property right to graze cattle on federal public lands. At the time plaintiffs' predecessors began ranching, grazing on the public domain was a privilege tacitly permitted by the government by an implied license. This license was revocable at the government's pleasure and conferred no right in plaintiffs or their predecessors to graze a specific allotment of land.
It is not disputed that the Diamond Bar and Laney allotments are located on national forest lands, where grazing is by permit only. Nor is it contested that plaintiffs grazed cattle on these allotments without a permit. Therefore, the district court acted properly in enjoining plaintiffs from further unauthorized grazing, in assessing unauthorized use fees, in directing removal of plaintiffs' cattle, and in finding plaintiffs in trespass of federal lands.
AFFIRMED.
To download or review this decision from the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals, the URL for this decision is: http://lawlib.wuacc.edu/ca10/cases/1999/02/97-2140.htm