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When the Bureau of Land Management (blm) was formed in 1946, the agency and the lands it managed had an ambiguous identity and future. Formed by President Truman through the merger of the General Land Offi ce and the U.S. Grazing Service, the blm inherited the remaining 450 million acres of public-domain lands in the American West and Alaska, which I will refer to simply as "the public lands. " 1 With those lands, the blm also inherited a set of property-rights regimes-that is, a set of property rights, privileges, and relationships that control land and resource access, withdrawal, management, exclusion, and alienation 2 -that were strongly refl ective of the nineteenthcentury frontier era. Th ey were marked by private initiative, self-regulation by public lands users, and common-law principles of prior use and appropriation. 3 Indeed, public lands users oft en acted as if they held common-law rights to the public lands, claims that western congressmen defended through appropriations and oversight.Since 1946 the property-rights regimes governing the public lands have evolved considerably, transforming the public lands from a self-regulated frontier to a permanent federal land system and transforming the blm from a custodial agency to a multiple-use management agency. Th ese transformations have been slow and halting, marked by more than one sagebrush rebellion and a substantial body of environmental litigation, and they are still challenged today. 4 Political battles over the public lands and the blm were particularly fi erce in the transition from the Carter to the Reagan james r. skillen
When the Bureau of Land Management (blm) was formed in 1946, the agency and the lands it managed had an ambiguous identity and future. Formed by President Truman through the merger of the General Land Offi ce and the U.S. Grazing Service, the blm inherited the remaining 450 million acres of public-domain lands in the American West and Alaska, which I will refer to simply as "the public lands. " 1 With those lands, the blm also inherited a set of property-rights regimes-that is, a set of property rights, privileges, and relationships that control land and resource access, withdrawal, management, exclusion, and alienation 2 -that were strongly refl ective of the nineteenthcentury frontier era. Th ey were marked by private initiative, self-regulation by public lands users, and common-law principles of prior use and appropriation. 3 Indeed, public lands users oft en acted as if they held common-law rights to the public lands, claims that western congressmen defended through appropriations and oversight.Since 1946 the property-rights regimes governing the public lands have evolved considerably, transforming the public lands from a self-regulated frontier to a permanent federal land system and transforming the blm from a custodial agency to a multiple-use management agency. Th ese transformations have been slow and halting, marked by more than one sagebrush rebellion and a substantial body of environmental litigation, and they are still challenged today. 4 Political battles over the public lands and the blm were particularly fi erce in the transition from the Carter to the Reagan james r. skillen
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