U.S. Supreme Court will not hear Utah’s lawsuit to control public lands

Kyle Dunphey
Utah News Dispatch

The U.S. Supreme Court announced last week it will not hear Utah’s sweeping public lands lawsuit, where the state argued it should take over 18.5 million acres of federally controlled land within its borders.

The state can still file another, similar lawsuit with a lower court. But as of last Monday morning, Utah’s ambitious legal challenge, which could have set the precedent for a massive land transfer across the West, is at a dead end.

Filed in August, the state had petitioned directly to the nation’s high court, asking justices to declare it unconstitutional for the Bureau of Land Management, or BLM, to hold on to land without a formal designation.

About 34 percent of the entire state, roughly 18.5 million acres, is “unappropriated land.” Controlled by the BLM, that land is still leased for grazing, mining or recreation, but lacks a designation, like a national forest or national park. Much of that land is in Utah’s West Desert.

In its complaint, Utah argued that it’s unconstitutional for the BLM to hold that unappropriated land in perpetuity. Utah invoked original jurisdiction, which allows states to petition directly to the U.S. Supreme Court in certain cases rather than go through lower courts first.

The lawsuit had the potential to unravel the federal government’s system of land management, as it would have likely set a precedent for other states to take over unappropriated land. A number of conservative politicians and Republican-led states filed briefs in support of the suit.

State leaders called the lawsuit “historic” — the state is better poised to manage land within its borders, they argued. The red tape that stymies forest management, permitting and industry would be gone, and local governments could generate more tax revenue. They launched a media campaign called “Stand for Our Land,” which included billboards, print, TV and radio ads and a website advocating for the state’s position in the lawsuit. That PR campaign, along with attorney fees, cost taxpayers more than $1 million.

Environmental groups called the suit a “land grab” — they have little faith in state leaders who promised they wouldn’t privatize the land if they got it, and worried that it would result in environmental degradation while costing the state an unknown amount.

“I don’t even know if Utah has the infrastructure to manage 18.5 million acres. How are we going to pay for this?” Utah House Minority Leader Luz Escamilla, D-Salt Lake City, said recently during a public lands rally.

But last week, the Supreme Court succinctly wrote: “The motion for leave to file a bill of complaint is denied,” marking an end, for now, to the lawsuit.

It’s unclear what the state’s next steps are. Gov. Spencer Cox previously told reporters that if the Supreme Court declined to hear the case, it would file in a lower court. The Utah attorney general’s office did not immediately provide comment.

Environmental groups celebrated the decision, including the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, which just a few weeks ago sued Utah over its Supreme Court challenge. The group argued that Utah had to dispose of that land for it to become a state, therefore any attempt to take it over violates the Utah Constitution.

“For more than 100 years, the Supreme Court has affirmed the power of the federal government to hold and manage public lands on behalf of all Americans,” said Steve Bloch, the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance’s legal director. “If successful, Utah’s lawsuit would result in the sale of millions of acres of public lands in redrock country to the highest bidder, an end to America’s system of federal public lands, and the dismantling of the American West as we know it.”

The Center for Western Priorities, a public lands advocacy nonprofit, called the announcement an “embarrassment” for the state, which has already “wasted millions of taxpayer dollars on this misguided lawsuit.”

“Even this staunchly conservative Supreme Court refused to take up Utah’s complaint, likely because it relies on a blatant misreading of the Constitution and would disrupt over a century of legal precedent and property law,” said the group’s executive director, Jennifer Rokala. “The state of Utah should give up on its wild goose chase and not waste even more taxpayer money fighting this losing battle in the lower courts.”

This story originally appeared on Utah News Dispatch and is republished under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.