Armed Feds Prepare For Showdown With Nevada Cattle Rancher

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Originally Posted by Glass

Didnt it come out somewhere that Reid and family had done a deal to supply land, that land to a Chinese conglomerate for some thing... I can't recall what exactly.

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There was a deal with a Chinese power company, but that land was south of Las Vegas, not connectd to the Bundy grazing land. The Chinese had also canceled the deal. However Reid and his family does own land next to the Bundy Ranch.

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Originally Posted by monty

https://nevadastatepersonnelwatch.wo...krisanne-hall/

http://youtu.be/X2se3fzbK0Y

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Excellent comments at the jewtube place.

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Originally Posted by monty

There was a deal with a Chinese power company, but that land was south of Las Vegas, not connectd to the Bundy grazing land. The Chinese had also canceled the deal. However Reid and his family does own land next to the Bundy Ranch.

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Hopefully his brother beats the shit out of him again just for fun.

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Originally Posted by Cebu_4_2

Thanks for the update Monty, I wonder what is going on currently over there.

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The Bundy Ranch blog is here. The archives are in a menu patrway down the righthand column.

http://bundyranch.blogspot.com/2015/...p-it-what.html

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Originally Posted by monty

The Bundy Ranch blog is here. The archives are in a menu patrway down the righthand column.

http://bundyranch.blogspot.com/2015/...p-it-what.html

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My browser dont give nothing but a couple posts. Not even cookie related.

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Originally Posted by Cebu_4_2

My browser dont give nothing but a couple posts. Not even cookie related.

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About halfway down is a clickable menu, year by year, month by month, click the triangle next to the year or the month you want to view, then click the topic, the browser should take you to that page.


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Wonder how much dough he would need at his donate button to make Senator Reid forget about the whole thing?

Senator Reid has been pretty lowkey since his exercise machine worked him over! I think may have gotten the message.

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Originally Posted by monty

Senator Reid has been pretty lowkey since his exercise machine worked him over! I think may have gotten the message.

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That was a punch up with his Brother wasn't it? Or maybe thats just a cover cover story.

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Originally Posted by Glass

That was a punch up with his Brother wasn't it? Or maybe thats just a cover cover story.

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i suspect that was just a cover story. I'll bet he stepped on the toes of one of his puppetmasters in Las Vegas. He seems to have gotten the message.

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Originally Posted by monty

i suspect that was just a cover story. I'll bet he stepped on the toes of one of his puppetmasters in Las Vegas. He seems to have gotten the message.

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Maybe it was some gangsters that he was supposed to get some land for. They were not happy

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Originally Posted by Glass

Maybe it was some gangsters that he was supposed to get some land for. They were not happy

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The latest attempt to take control of two million acres of land in Nevada is just another attempt of those gangsters. They probably arn't to happy with Harry for not delivering the Bundy ranch to them in the last try.

This six part article was written May 2014. The subject of abuse be the feds should always be in the forefront of the libes of the American people.

The Bundy Standoff-A Century of Federal Abuse

THE BUNDY STANDOFF—A CENTURY OF ABUSE
PART 1

By Michael S. Coffman, Ph.D

May 17, 2014

NewsWithViews.com

Original Intent

For days following April 8, hundreds of well-armed Bureau of Land Management (BLM), and even hundreds more partially-armed Bundy supporters stood toe-to-toe. Any spark could have caused another Waco. Finally, the BLM backed off, allegedly for safety reasons. Don’t believe it. There is a much bigger story here and the media is wrong on most counts.

Most Americans have no idea that over 50 percent of the Western U.S. is owned or controlled by the federal or state governments. This creates a feudal relationship between an all-powerful government and the local landowners who must use the adjacent federal land to make a living. As with the feudal governments in Europe during the middle-ages, the land is managed for the benefit of the government, not the landowner, using a dangerous ideology called Sustainable Development. Produced by Environmental Perspectives, Inc., Bangor, ME 04401

MOST AMERICAN’S WHO LIVE EAST OF THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS, or those who live in large urban/suburban areas in the West, are surprised to learn that the federal government owns or controls over 30 percent of the land area in the United States. Most of that land is in the Western States where over 50 percent of the state is federal “public land.” Rural residents that make their living from federal lands are finding that Washington is enacting regulations that seem more intent on bankrupting them than helping them. An uninformedpopula¬tion in the East is complicit by default.

The closest form of governmentwhere the federal government dominatesthe lives of those people using federal land is feudalism/manorialism. This is a form of government whereby an all-powerful land owner, usually royalty, rents his land with restrictions and with the condition of receiving a portion of the crops or other services from the renter. Today the federal government replaces the king as the landlord. This new king serves Washington special inter¬ests, usu¬ally environ¬mentalist and inter¬national dictates, which are con¬trary to the interests of the local rancher or land user. Too often they are also contrary to actual environ¬mental health.

To understand what has happened and is happening with the Bundy Ranch it is mandatory to understand the history of American expansion westward. It may be boring for some, but unless the history is understood, numerous false assumptions and conclusions will be made. The media and bloggers have done far more harm than good in their analyses.

Original intent.

As with almost everything else that has been twisted from original intent, the Founders never intended there should be large federal landownership. When they wrote the U.S. Constitution, feudalism and manorialism Existeded in http://gold-silver.us/forum/webkit-f...73377/imagegifhttp://gold-silver.us/forum/safari-r...mages/text.gifFrance. Our Founders were eye-witnesses to the brutal treatment of the peasants under such a system. In 1783 Thomas Jefferson even went so far as to insist that all federal land should be sold as quickly as possible and, “shall never after, in any case, revert to the United States.”

To ensure that the federal govern¬ment never amassed large land holdings, our Founders allow¬ed only three forms of federal land own¬ership and jurisdic¬tion in Article I Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution: "To establish Post Offices and post Roads;" "To exercise exclusive Legislation…, over such District [of Columbia](not to exceed ten Miles square);"… " and to exercise like Authority over all Places purchased by the Consent of the Legislature of the State…for the Erec¬tion of Forts, Magazines, Arsenals, Dock Yards, and other needful buildings." (Italics added)

With these constitutional constraints, how did the federal government wind up with more than 50 percent of the land in every state west of the Rocky Mountains? Why not the East as well? Most important, what does it have to do with the Bundy ranch?
Everything.

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Map of the states and territories of the United States as it was from August 1780 to 1790. On August 7 1789 the Northwest Territory was organized. On May 26 1790, the Territory South of the Ohio River was organized.Made by Golbez.
Used under the GNU Free Documentation License

The individual states were so fearful of an all-powerful central government that they essentially gave no power to the federal government under the Articles of Confeder¬ation. The failure of the Articles led to its replacement by the U.S. Constitution of the United States in 1787. The chief failure of the Articles was, as George Washington put it so succinctly, “no money.” The federal government was deeply in debt following the Revolutionary War, but had no way under the Articles to repay it except by printing useless paper money that had no value.

To pay the debt, the states eventually ceded their state land to the federal government in a trust. The trust limited its use to that of repaying the debt. Virginia’s 1783 “Cession of Western Lands to the United States” was the first to do so. The Act stated “…that the territory so ceded shall be…formed into states,…and the States so formed shall be distinct republican States, and admitted members of the Federal Union, having the same rights of sovereignty, freedom, and independence as other States….” (Italics added)

http://gold-silver.us/forum/webkit-f...6b1bf/imagegif This was known as the “Equal Footing Doctrine,” whereby every state entered statehood on an equal footing with all states already existing.

The Equal Footing Doctrine was formalized for the entire U.S. with the passage of the Northwest Ordinance in 1787, but only after the federal government sold the land to pay down the debt by stipulating that new states “in no case, shall interfere with the primary disposal of the soil by the united States in Congress assembled.” It also stipulated “that no tax shall be imposed on lands on the property of the United States.” However, once the population reached 60,000 people, each new state would be admitted on an “equal footing with the original States, in all respects whatever.”

This extended:

“the fundamental principles of civil and religious liberty, which form the basis whereon these republics, their laws and constitutions are erected; to fix and establish those principles as the basis of all laws, constitutions, and governments, which forever hereafter shall be formed in the said territory: to provide also for the establishment of States, and permanent government therein, and for their admission to a share in the federal councils on an equal footing with the original States…”

Notice that it was passed as a basic human right, not to be altered by any future legislation. Yet, it was totally ignor¬ed in the creation of states west of the Rocky Mountains. That fundamental right was codified in its entirety into the U.S. Constitution the same year. Federal lands within the territories were “trusts” that would be transferred to the state when it became a state. New states had to be given the same rights as the original statesonce they reached a population of 60,000 people. There is absolutely no Constitutional basis for “federal land ownership” on the scale of that found in the far West. None. This has a direct bearing on the Bundy Ranch case as will be discussed in Parts II and III.

Continued:

Michael Coffman -- The Bundy Standoff-A Century of Abuse

continuation

The Northwest Ordinance also codified the principle that land ceded by the states would be used to pay the war debt and not held in perpetuity by the federal government. The Act also allowed the creation of the Northwest Terri¬tories, (now Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin and a portion of Minnesota) which was formally accomp¬lished in 1789.Historians consider the ordinance to be the most significant achievement under the Articles of Confederation. It set the form by which subsequent Western territories were created and later admitted into the Union as states.

Early Evolution of Land Law

Although it was fraught with controversy and power plays, all future states east of the Rocky Mountains did enter the federal Union over the next 100 years on a more or less equal footing. The federal government for the most part did not retain large blocks of land. Of the many things that happened during that period, the most notable are the Preemption Acts of 1830 and 1841, the Homestead Act of 1862 and the Act of 1866 (see sidebar).

(I was not able to include the sidebars or the map.)

The mid 1800s created chaos in Western policy as the tension, and then Civil War between the North and South resulted in turbulent allegiances and politics. The Mexican War also occurred during the mid-1800s and was ended with the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in 1848. Part of the settlement in the treaty required Mexico to cede all its territory to the U.S. from Texas to Colorado and westward to the Pacific. Most importantly, Article VIII of the treaty clearly stated:

Mexicans now established in territories previously belonging to Mexico, and which remain for the future within the limits of the United States, as defined by the present treaty, shall be free to continue where they now reside, or to remove at any time to the Mexican Republic, retaining the property which they possess in the said territories, or disposing thereof, and removing the proceeds wherever they please, without their being subjected, on this account, to any contribution, tax, or charge whatever.

The word Mexicans in Article VIII also included Americans. The conditions of the treaty stipulated, without exception, that the U.S. honor any and all property rights granted to the residents of the newly created U.S. territory. This included all types of property rights, especially water and grazing. By this time, much of it was already settled, including timber rights in the forested area. Since the treaty closely paralleled the Preemption Act of 1841, few people paid attention to it. Also, since the federal government did not set up administrative units in the territory for years, the ranchers, timber barons and others continued to do what they had always done.

Growing a crop to harvest was very problem¬atic. If the rancher’s 160 acres contained a perennial stream, the owner could perhaps irrigate; if able to afford the equipment. Few could. Because life was so hard, a majority of Homesteads fell victim to speculators who bought the land at steeply discounted prices.

The Enlarged Homestead Act of 1909 increased the acreage of the homestead to 320 acres. This gave most homesteads east of the Rocky Mountains sufficient acreage for marginal dry-land farming. If the 320 acre homestead had water, a small herd of livestock could even be raised. The 1916 Stock-Raising Homestead Act increased the acreage once again to 640 acres for ranching purposes. With these three Acts, most of the land east of the Rockies was quickly settled by homesteaders and very little land remained as Public Domain. However, the three Acts still did not provide sufficient acreage for arid homesteading west of the Rockies so most land remained in the Public Domain.

Ranchers owning homesteads west of the Rockies had another problem. Not only did they need water for their livestock, the parched land would not support much forage for grazing. They required thousands of acres to graze a herd large enough to sustain a family in even marginal comfort. The answer was Preemptive Rights of Appropriation, where the rancher used his or her homestead as a base and grazed his cattle on public land called open range (without fences). They could use, but not own the public land. The open range led to bitter range wars when one homesteader/owner’s livestock grazing encroached upon another.

Since water was life in the west, water wars were also common. They were a type of range war whereby one homesteader would dam up a creek, usually for watering livestock, thereby denying water to downstream homesteaders. Even without these conflicts, water was extremely precious, perhaps more so than gold. Ranchers built ditches, water tanks were dug and seeps enlarged. Often these were on public lands upon which the cattle and sheep were grazed. The more water that could be developed, the more livestock that could be grazed; limited only by the forage produced.

This use of water on public land evolved into a property right that was codified by Congress as a “pre-existing right of possession” by a law, simply labeled the Act of 1866. This Act started what is known as the “split estate” in which one owner, the federal government in this case, owns the land and another owner, the homesteader, owns the mineral, grazing and/or water rights. The Act gave mineral rights to those miners actively mining the public lands and water rights to ranchers actively grazing the public lands. All other mineral and water rights remained with the federal government. These water and mineral rights were strengthened by the Act of 1870 and especially by the Desert Land Act of 1877.

This provides some of the legal ground on which Bundy makes his case. But he made it to the wrong court. Although the U.S. District Court which ruled against Bundy, does have jurisdiction, itrules on administrative, civil and criminal law, not specifically Constitutional law. As detailed in Part II, rarely does the District Court use the U.S. Constitution in deciding a case, even though it should. In other words, since the BLM followed the laws governing the BLM and case law, Bundy lost. That’s why most ranchers lose in District Court. The fact that Bundy lost in District Court is almost constitutionally meaningless in understanding the issue.

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The media, for the most part has incorrectly used the District Court cases as hard-core evidence that Bundy was wrong. That does not make him wrong constitutionally.It is likely he will now sue in the U.S. Court of Federal Claims which hears claims for monetary damages that arise from the United States Constitution, federal statutes, executive regulations, or an express or implied in fact contract with the United States Government. As explained in Part VI, this lawsuit will probably have an entirely different outcome than in the U.S. District Court.

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This admittedly abbreviated and simplified history glosses over the messiness and even lawlessness of the process. In retrospect the Preemption and homestead laws didn’t really work as intended. Most of the homesteads failed, and unscrupulous speculators greatly profited at the expense of the homesteaders. Yet, some homesteaders did succeed. More importantly the land shifted from public to private ownership where it would eventually become the “breadbasket of the world.”

Fortunately for the world, land east of the Rocky Mountains has very little federal land today because of federal policy and constitutional restrictions based on the Equal Footing doctrine of the Northwest Ordinance. What happened to radically change well-established Constitutional law? Two new unconstitutional laws in the late 1800s radically changed the public land west of the Rockies by keeping it in the hands of the federal government. That change was destined to become a disaster for people who had to make a living from that land.

Click here for part -----> 1, 2, 3,

© 2014 Michael Coffman - All Rights Reserved

Footnotes:

1. Feudalism was the political, economic, and military system of the middle ages. It involved the bequeathing of land and protection from kings down to nobles, down to knights, and down to the peasants, who could own no property and were at the mercy of the nobility. Manorialism refers to the economic system on a fief, either part of the fief or the whole as a manor - a self-sufficient, isolated village.

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The last Nevada rancher who won big time in the Court of Federal Claims did so post posthumously. It is possible to win but less likely this occurs during your own lifetime.

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Originally Posted by palani

The last Nevada rancher who won big time in the Court of Federal Claims did so post posthumously. It is possible to win but less likely this occurs during your own lifetime.

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Quoted for trurh.

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THE BUNDY STANDOFF—A CENTURY OF ABUSE
PART 2

By Michael S. Coffman, Ph.D
May 29, 2014
NewsWithViews.com

Part II—Unconstitutional Deviance and the U.S. War on the West

After rapid Western Expansion to the Rocky Mountains in the nineteenth century, the United States suddenly reversed its land disposal policy by not ceding its public lands to the states, ignoring 100 years of well-established law and constitutional limitation. U.S. District Courts stopped using constitutional law and started using case law, opening the law to judicial corruption. This policy change was driven by progressive northeastern financiers and industrialists committed to take the West for their own benefit.

HUMAN NATURE DICTATES that if no one is legally responsible for something, people who benefit from using that something will tend to do whatever is fast and cheap to get what they want. That’s true for anything. Natural resources are no exception. Without any oversight, it was not long before Western mining and timber companies were causing harm to the resource base on public lands in the late 1800s. Progressives of the day used the exaggerated writings of naturalists like John Muir to enrage Eastern audiences to the alleged destruction. Just as they do today, an ill-informed population demanded it be stopped.

Indeed, something had to be done. The government could have just deeded the land to the ranchers, timber and mining companies as a Preemption Right as they had done east of the Rocky Mountains. However, giving the huge areas of arid range and forest land needed to maintain economic viability to http://www.newswithviews.com/Coffman/images/Text1.gifindividual ranchers and timber companies stuck in the craw of Easterners, especially the progressives of the day. Besides, it was argued that the preemption and homestead laws had failed to accomplish their intended purpose. Instead of being settled by long-term farmers and ranchers, the 160 acre homesteads were too small to be economically viable and most homesteaders sold out to speculators.

Little did that generation know that the seeming failure of the Preemption and Homestead Acts would eventually provide the greatest blessing the world has ever known as the Midwest became known as the bread basket of the world. At the time, however, the program seemed to have failed. That was the reason Congress revoked the preemption laws and kept the land by passing the Forest Reserve and General Revision Acts of 1891. In doing so, Congress violated the U.S. Constitution.

Article IV, Section 3, paragraph 2 of the Constitution gives Congress the “power to dispose of and make all needful rules and regulations respecting the Territory or other property belonging to the United States.” It dealt with territories, not states. Conversely, as discussed in Part I, Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution severely limits the type of land the federal government can actually own to federal highways, the District of Columbia and, with the consent of the state legislature of “Forts, Magazines, Arsenals, Dock-Yards, and other needful buildings.”

Obviously, most of the nearly 650 million acres now allegedly“owned” by the federal government west of the Rockies do not qualify constitutionally. True, the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo ceded the land to the U.S. government in 1948. However, most of that land was already given by Mexican grants to settlers, mining companies or timber companies as working land. These settlers were protected with strong property rights language in Section VIII of the treaty.

According to the Equal Footing Doctrine those rights should have been kept by the landowners when the territories became states. The U.S. government did recognize these property rights – except when it didn’t. The U.S. government ignored the treaty when it served the purpose of the unscrupulous politicians, bureaucrats and industrial tycoons. The convoluted history of what happened from 1848 through the early 1900s is a book in itself.

The foundational basis in deciding the legal ownership rests on two concrete facts:1) the U.S. cannot “own” this land constitutionally, even though it claims it does. Upon entering the United States the new western state should have been given land not claimed by the settlers. They were not. 2) The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo which is a constitutional instrument should have protected the settlers’ vested property rights. It did not.

On the other side of the issue, many property rights activists claim that since the federal government has no deed to the land, the government therefore has no rights. That’s true to a point. However, the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo is the “deed.” The treaty gave the U.S. certain surface and sometimes mineral rights, often on the same land owned by the settlers. The Act of 1866 (see Part I) attempted to sort out the split estate concept with important but somewhat mixed results.

Congress passed the Organic Act of 1897, establishing “science-based” forest and range management guidelines and the use of grazing permits and fees for the newly minted forest reserves that were created in 1891. Scientific range management would morph in the later 1900s into the tool by which political objectives would be reached. The Transfer Act of 1905 created the U.S. Forest Service (USFS) within the Department of Agriculture. The Weeks Act (also known as the Organic Act) of 1911 allowed the USFS to purchase and create additional National Forests in the East.

The Taylor Grazing Act of 1934 established prior rights for the ranchers and eventually allowed the conversion of the old General Land Office in the Department of Interior into the Bureau of Land Management (BLM). Together the USFS and BLM today employ about 40,000 people who manage 446 million acres at a cost of over $7 billion a year. Totally, the U.S. controls over 30 percent of the U.S., amounting to over 50 percent of every state west of the Rocky Mountains. (See map)

As will be discussed in Parts III-VI, an incredible war between the federal government and western ranchers has been going on since 1891 mostly under the radar; pushed and funded by powerful northeastern progressive financiers and industrialists. What’s happening to Cliven Bundy and other ranchers is the result of that war. Central to what is happening today was the deliberate conversion of Constitutional law into case law in the courts, as Bundy and hundreds of thousands of Americans have found out the hard way. It has led to a very corrupted legal system that tragically has no fidelity to the restrictions imposed by the U.S. Constitution.

Constitutional Law vs. Case Law

Although most American’s are not even aware of it, courts no longer use Constitutional law in deciding cases. They now use case law. That wasn’t always the case. In fact, Constitutional law and principles were part of the early education of children. French judge, statesman and political writer Alexis de Tocqueville observed a phenomenal thing in Volume II of his Democracy in America when he visited America in 1831:

If you question [an American] respecting his own country…he will inform you what his rights are and by what means he exercises them…. You will find that he is familiar with the mechanism of the laws…. The American learns to know the laws by participating in the act of legislation…. The great work of society is ever going on before his eyes, and, as it were, under his hands. In the United States, politics are the end and aim of education.

The concept of “natural” sovereignty of citizens over the state was the foundation of the U.S. Constitution and culture of the United States. It created the “American Way” which was unique in the history of mankind. In early America, Constitutional law and these principles were taught in school. They were so strong and generally known by every American that they quickly extinguished the early attempts by progressives that the state is sovereign over the citizen. Today, most Americans commonly believe that the federal government is sovereign over the state, the state over the local government, and the local government over the citizen. That is opposite of what the U.S. Constitution actually says and will create tyranny eventually. Americans are blind with ignorance of their heritage and liberties. Today, not even attorneys know what the average American knew in the 1800s.

However, a group of men who coveted power gradually introduced the statistinto the American education system. They had a goal; the same goal that megalomaniacs have had throughout history—to rule the world.

These would-be rulers knew they could never attain that goal as long as the people understood the U.S. Constitution and the principles upon which it stood. As students of history, they knew that nations ruled by the statist model were populated by citizens who could be easily manipulated to do what the rulers wanted. After all, socialism and communism train people from early childhood to obey the all-knowing government—the source of all power. Tragically, they have instilled this goal for several generations in America’s public school system.

Widespread constitutional understanding began to diminish in the late nineteenth century when Christopher Langdell was hired by Harvard University in the mid-1800s expressly to change the direction of the highly influential Harvard Law School. Simultaneously, progressives were first attempting to weaken the interpretation of the U.S. Constitution to mean anything they wanted. It wouldn’t be called a “living document” in its modern form until Oliver Wendell Holmes spoke of the concept, if not the actual phrase.

Prior to Langdell, law schools taught law by lecturing from the Constitution and law itself. When Langdell became Dean of the Harvard Law School, he taught law by reviewing previous case law. In doing so the Constitution and the actual legislated law was ignored. By the twentieth century, the case law approach was adopted by all U.S. law schools. U.S. District Court cases were no longer decided by the U.S. Constitution or the written law, but by previous cases. By incrementally making small changes in lawsuits, each successive decision can actually reverse the original intent of the U.S. Constitution or legislated law. It is legislation from the bench.

No longer were students forced to dig into constitutional wording and intent, but instead were taught how appellate courts ruled in specific cases. Although the District Court can use the U.S. Constitution and the actual law, it rarely does. Often it is because the attorney representing the rancher or citizen has never been taught real constitutional law. Tragically, actual teaching of the Constitution in law schools is almost nonexistent today. This is not an exaggeration. In the case of Bundy, revisionist case law was applied by an agenda driven and arrogant BLM to put Bundy’s fellow ranchers out of business.

At the risk of oversimplification, if it were not for the Forest Reserve and General Revision Acts of 1891, and revisionist case law, much, if not most of this USFS/BLM land and its associated management costs would now be in private or state ownership. There wouldn’t be a war on ranchers and other natural resource users because there would have been no power for radical environmentalists and agency bureaucrats to create the growing evil they have inflicted over the past 60 years.

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The accusation by environmentalists and federal agencies that private owners would have destroyed these vast tracts of lands is totally unjustified. While it may have been true with open un-owned range, history has clearly shown that once a resource is in private hands, management quality will generally increase because of self-interest and the need to protect the resource for future income. The deterioration of forests and rangelands managed by the USFS and BLM today is a tragic testament to what happens with public ownership subject to special interest political pressure.

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So is Bundy right or wrong? Constitutionally, he seems to be right, but case law says he isn’t. That may change. Bundy now has standing in the U.S. Court of Federal Claims. This little known court is focused on deciding constitution-based lawsuits, not administrative lawsuits. Bundy gained standing when the BLM confiscated his cattle, destroyed his water troughs and corrals, and then deliberately killed several head of cattle, including two of his breeding bulls. Those are within his century-old property rights granted by the Treaty of Guadeloupe Hidalgo. If he can get the financial support, he may actually win on a constitutional basis. It will be interesting. For part one click below.

Click here for part -----> 1, 2, 3,

© 2014 Michael Coffman - All Rights Reserved

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THE BUNDY STANDOFF—A CENTURY OF ABUSE
PART 3

By Michael S. Coffman, Ph.D
June 3, 2014
NewsWithViews.com

Part III—The Massive Attack on Western Prior Property Rights

Key Legislation Affecting Land Ownership West of the Rocky Mountains

Forest Reserve and General Revision Acts of 1891. Gave the president the unconstitutional power of creating vast federal reservations of forest and range land to be managed by the federal government. It also revoked all preemption laws passed and established earlier in the century that allowed homesteaders to keep the land and water rights they had historically used. (See Part I) This turned the federal government into an unconstitutional landlord.

Organic Act of 1897. Formally called the Sundry Civil Approp¬riations Act of 1897. Established administration and protection guidelines for management requirements of federal lands, including the use of grazing permits and fees. Author¬ized the Dept. of Interior the authority for rule-making and regulation of Reserves. Authorized the General Land Office to hire employ¬ees and open the forest reserves for public use.

Transfer Act of 1905. Created the U.S. Forest Service (USFS) within the Dept. of Agriculture.

Weeks Act of 1911. Also called the Organic Act. Allowed the U.S. Forest Service to purchase and create new National Forests in Eastern States.

Enlarged Homestead Act of 1909. Enlarged the acreage of a Homestead to 320 acres because 160 acres proved too little for the arid West. The two homestead acts were instrumental in settling the land between the Rockies and Mississippi River.

Stock-Raising Homestead Act of 1916. Increased the acreage to 640 acres to encourage more ranching home-steads west of the Rockies. Not extensively used because 640 acres was still not enough to economically raise livestock.

Taylor Grazing Act of 1934. Allowed the creation of the Division of Grazing and the U.S. Grazing Service within the General Land Office. In 1946 the. Bureau of Land Manage¬ment (BLM) was created out of the Grazing Service and placed under the Dept. of Interior. The creation of the USFS and BLM established the structure for the tyrannical feudal/manorial forms of governance.

Federal Land Policy and Management Act and the National Forest Management Act, both in 1976.Created under heavy pressure from environmentalists, these altruistic environmental laws changed the relationship between the federal agencies and landowners/minors to one of much greater conflict. FLPMA also codified federal claim to public lands.

Sustainable Communities, Early to Mid-1990s. Not a law passed by Congress, but a radical shift in U.S. policy to adapt environmental regulations and management to the “eco-spiritual sustainable” policies of the UN’s Agenda 21. This shift is devastating resource users and communities who depend on federal land to survive in the West.

At the direction of a powerful group of progressive northeastern financiers and industrialists, called the northern core, Congress deliberately scrapped the Equal Footing Doctrine embedded in the Northwest Ordinance and the U.S. Constitution.

AS THE ABUNDANT WEALTH IN WESTERN territories became known, powerful forces attempted to manipulate the federal government so they would have total control over the West’s resources. These industrialists and financiers were known as the northern core. The northern core was aided in their efforts by the tumultuous pre and post-Civil War and the very fluid politics and events surrounding it.

The chaotic mid-1800s spawnedtremendous discord in Western policy as the tension between the North and South built.Turbulent allegiances were created. California’s Mother Lode country was populated mostly by Southerners aligned with the South against the North pre-Civil War. Because of this, the North allowed California to become a state in 1850 to bring it under the North’s control. The North also used statehood to wrestCalifornia from increasing control by the Mormons for their newly self-proclaimed State of Deseret in 1849, a portion of which reached all the way to the Pacific Ocean. Congress turned down the Mormon’s request for statehood in 1850 when it allowed California statehood.[1]

The North also didn’t want the Mormons to control Nevada’s Comstock Lode either, so it systematically cut them off from Western Nevada.Congress simultaneously declared the Territory of Utah in 1850 when it turned down the Mormon’s request for its self-proclaimed State of Deseret. Things were so unstable and the federal government so desperate to control its silver, that Nevada was allowed statehood in 1864 – even though it didn’t have the requisite population of 60 thousand people. The decade’s long crisis allowed the federal government to maintain control over the public lands and set the example by which the remaining Western territories would be admitted as states after 1864.[2]

Taking advantage of the tremendous disarray and discord, the northern core manipulated the federal government into not ceding the land to the states upon statehood, as required by the Northwest Ordinance and U.S. Constitution, and to weaken the property rights guaranteed by the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo and the Preemption Act of 1941 to the ranchers. That attack on the West continues today. Although it had been brewing for several years, the opening salvo was the Forest Reserve and General Revision Acts of 1891.

The Forest Reserve and General Revision Acts of 1891

The pesky constitutional limitation established in the Equal Footing Doctrine did not stop Congress from totally ignoring it when passingthe Forest Reserve and General Revision Acts in 1891. It was made possible only with tremendous pressure from progressive northeastern industrialists and socialists and their stooges in Congress. They used the granting of statehood toCalifornia and Nevada during the turbulent years of the Civil War as precedent. Desperate to control the vast gold and silver wealth for the North, the public lands were never ceded to the two states (see Part I).

In addition to violating very specific limitations in the Constitution, the Forest Reserve and General Revision Acts also trumped the Equal Footing Doctrine and effectively sacked the 10th Amendment to the Constitution.Many scholars and attorneys believe that to be unconstitutional. The Equal Footing Doctrine, discussed in Part I, effectively requires new states to enter the Union having the same rights as former states – which in this case meant no federal land without the consent of the new state legislature.

The federal government actually used federal troops to enforce their decrees over the state government in the forest reserves. Those in charge of the reserves also asserted the doctrine of sovereign immunity. They were seemingly untouchable.

The Forest Reserve Act gave the president vast powers to “set apart and reserve, in any state or territory having public land bearing forest, …as public reservations.” Lack of Congressional funding delayed implementation of the Forest Reserve and General Revision Acts until the Organic Act of 1897 was passed.

Although the new states strenuously objected to it, none challenged the constitutionality of the law. They couldn’t if the territory wanted to become a state, they could not demand Equal Footing or insist on the U.S. Constitutional requirements for the federal government to transfer the rights to the public land to the state. Not to put too fine a point on it, but that’s extortion and blackmail If any citizen or business tried to do the same thing. Apparently, in the progressive ideology, that is not only correct, but is as it should be; government sovereignty over the states and citizens. That realization should rock every American to the core.

Greed and Corruption

It is not generally known that the real reason the two acts were passed, and it borders on the bizarre. After an exhaustive study of how these blatantly unconstitutional Acts were passed, Wayne Hage, who was a dogged researcher and victim of the BLM and USFS himself, found a clear paper trail in the National Achieves back to the “northern core.” The core was made up of very powerful Northeastern progressive financiers and industrialists who wanted to control the West for its minerals, hydro power, and other natural resources. Controlling water was the key. Water was, and still is, gold. There was never enough of it. Says Hage:

“If northeastern industrialists and financiers controlled the water needed for the development of western mines, their control of the output of the mines would increase. The processing of trees into salable lumber from the western forests also depended largely on water. Stockmen needed water to raise livestock. If control of water on the forest reserves could be obtained, the stockmens’ preemptive rights could be eliminated.”[3]

His meticulously referenced book Storm Over Rangeland has become an important legal reference book used in many court cases. Although the Forest Service and BLM had been harassing Hage for years, immediately after the book’s publication, the two agencies launched a blistering retaliation on his Nevada ranch and is discussed in Part V.

Hage’s sleuthing of original documents in the National Achieves found that the northern core and the American Forestry Association provided enormous pressure and funding to get the Forest Reserve Act passed. Once the U.S. Forest Service was created with the 1905 Transfer Act, it too worked on the inside for the same goals. The 1891 Forest Reserve Act allegedly gave the federal government legal sovereignty over forest reserves as federal enclosures; federal property exempt from state laws. The federal government actually used federal troops to enforce their decrees over the state government in the forest reserves.[4] Those in charge of the reserves also asserted the doctrine of sovereign immunity. They were seemingly untouchable.

The most astonishing thing, however, was that they used Article I, Section 8, Clause 17 of the U.S. Constitution to justify their actions[5] – the very constitutional language that actually forbids them from doing what they did!As repeatedly stated in this series of articles, this language severely limits the type of land the federal government can actually own to “federal highways, the District of Columbia,” and “only with the consent of the state legislatureof “Forts, Magazines, Arsenals, Dock-Yards, and other needful buildings.” Forest reserves fit none of these categories of ownership and no state gave its approval in any way. This was the raw power of the northern core. Bundy and others are still suffering what these greedy industrialists started over a hundred years ago.

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“Wresting control of the water from the states was a primary objective of national forest administrators,” according to the original documents Hage’s found. “If the federal government had legal sovereignty over forest reserves as federal enclosures, western water law would be gutted.” Suddenly, it becomes clear why the 1891 Forest Reserve Act created forest reserves that encompassed all the water and minerals in question.By doing so, “The total subjection of the West would be complete,” observed Hage.[6]

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Because of the socialist oriented education of most people less than fifty years of age, there is the common understanding that the U.S. Constitution is outdated, written for an agrarian society. It is not. It’s as valid and important to our freedoms today as it was when it was penned. It was specifically designed to chain down and lock government power so the government could never become more powerful than the people. Although that purpose has been trashed by case law and unconstitutional legislation today, that primary purpose was still in place in 1907. The northern core was about to crash headlong into that reality.

Click here for part -----> 1, 2, 3, 4,

Footnotes:

1. Wayne Hage. Storm Over Rangeland. (Merrill Press, Bellevue, WA, 1989). P. 49.
2. Ibid, P. 49-51.
3. Wayne Hage. Storm Over Rangeland. (Merrill Press, Bellevue, WA, 1989). Pp 167-168.
4. Ibid, P. 167
5. Ibid
6. Wayne Hage. Storm Over Rangeland. (Merrill Press, Bellevue, WA, 1989).P 168.

© 2014 Michael Coffman - All Rights Reserved


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THE BUNDY STANDOFF—A CENTURY OF ABUSE
PART 4

By Michael S. Coffman, Ph.D
June 17, 2014
NewsWithViews.com

Part IV—The U.S. Constitution Trumps the Northern Core’ Plans

The 1891 Forest Reserve and General Revision Acts were passed by powerful lobbying by the Northern Core and corrupt politicians in Congress. The goal of the two Acts was to strip Western Resource Users of their property rights and states of their constitutional right to receive all federal land upon becoming a state as per the U.S. Constitution. In 1907 their plans seemingly failed when they slammed headlong into the Constitution.

Colorado v. Kansas, 1907 Supreme Court Decision

In 1906-07 the Forest Service and the northern core ran into a brick wall. Following the Forest Reserve Act’s passage in 1891, Colorado began using more and more of the water from these reserves, just as was intended by the conspirators. This threatened Kansas and Kansas sued. It went to the U.S. Supreme Court. The Kansas v. Colorado Supreme Court’s decision May 13, 1907 stated:

The government of the United States is one of enumerated powers; that it has no inherent powers of sovereignty; that the enumeration of the powers http://www.newswithviews.com/Coffman/images/image13.gifgranted is to be found in the Constitution of the United States, and in that alone; that the manifest purpose of the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution is to put beyond dispute the proposition that all powers not granted are reserved to the people, and that if, in the changes of the years, further powers ought to be possessed by Congress, they must be obtained by a new grant from the people. (Italics and underline added)

In other words, the federal government has no sovereign right to the water in the West. It was declared unconstitutional. Also, the land belonging to the national government within the states is subject to the law of those states. Additionally, the only control of the waters of an interstate stream by congress is in respect to the question of navigation, not how it was used by the state or the users. Those rights, as clearly stated in the 10th Amendment belonged to the people or the state. Finally, the state has full jurisdiction over all lands and non-navigable streams within its borders and that it (the state) may determine which law shall govern with respect to such lands and waters…

“The attempted usurpation of federal power by congress and the executive departments growing out of the federal possession of public lands is properly rebuked and nullified,” according to the Pueblo Chieftain.[1] The northern core financiers/industrialists, USDA (Agriculture), USFS (Forest Service) and American Forestry Association all conspired to pull off one of the greatest land thefts ever, but failed. The case did not touch on grazing rights, so that remained, and still does, in a legal quandary. The Court’s decision on water rights, however, was a severe blow to the conspirators’ plot to take over the West as a feudal fiefdom.

Remember, the 1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo gave the existing settlers and future owners absolute property rights defined in the grants given them by Mexico over the land they were using. It was quite similar to the Preemption Act of 1841 that was strengthened by the Act of 1866 (see Part I). The U.S. government did not even begin to administer the new territory until many years later and the ranchers continued to operate as if nothing had changed. It hadn’t at that time.

The Forest Reserve Act of 1891 radically changed that balance by quietly revoking the Preemption Act of 1841. Grazing fees laws were enacted in the Organic Act of 1897, and while it was unpopular it did strengthen the prior http://www.newswithviews.com/Coffman/images/image14.gif

the reserves, using the1991 Forest Reserve Act as the legal basis.[2]

When the northern core/Forest Service/American Forestry Association lost the Colorado v. Kansas Supreme Court case, the conspirators went into a panic, even suggesting the Forest Service ignore the Supreme Court’s decision. Hage found quote after quote where the conspirators were in utter dismay.For instance, in a letter to Chief of the Forest Service, Gifford Pinchot on May 23, 1907, General William J. Palmer, point man for the northern core could not believe “that the Court intended its decision to be so far reaching…” Acting law officer of the Forest Service, G. S. Arnold, asked in a June 24, 1907 letter to Dr. Will, Secretary of the American Forestry Association: “I am under the impression that the interpretation of the case…is rather too broad, so far as it admits restrictions upon the absolute government control of the water upon Government Land.”[3]

This reaction of the conspirators is bizarre. The question must be asked; why were they so shocked? The Colorado v. Kansas decision was based on the U.S. Constitution, which forbade the exact thing northern core tried to pull off by force and massive expenditures of money. This group was so powerful that their perception of reality was, in fact, disconnected from reality. Psychiatrists have noted this “disconnect” phenomenon by true progressives (this does not include liberals; liberals have a different ideology than progressivism) since the 1800s.[4] As explained in Part VI, the same thing appears to be happening today with progressives and could partially explain the BLM’s extreme overreach against Bundy.

Although the Forest Reserve Act supposedly withdrew the preemption laws of 1830 and 1841, the preexisting Treaty of Guadalupe trumped that portion of the Act; at least in the states originating from the treaty. The Court’s ruling in Colorado v. Kansas threatened the Forest Service’s newly acquired control over livestock grazing.The Court ruled that the state, not the Forest Service had jurisdictional authority over the rangeland. The northern core and Forest Service, lost the battle, but had no intention of giving up control over the forest reserves. The Service did grudgingly comply with the Court’s decision, without formally acknowledging it. At the same time, it began devising methods to weaken the decision.[5]

Using Deception

Ironically, the Forest Service didn’t start with lawsuits against ranchers, but with carrots and goodies. While seeming to support the ranchers, the Service began to conduct a very deceptive sleight of hand to trap ranchers into binding contracts, according to Hage. “The Forest Service and its supporters,” said Hage, “worked diligently during this period to the preemptive property rights challenge by winning over stockmen to their side by giving the stockmen who held valid prior rights claims a privileged position in securing and expanding grazing permits.”[6] It worked.

Discussion of preemptive rights all but disappeared by the now privileged class of stockmen. The U.S. Forest Service also sweet-talked the stockmen into forming live-stock associations. This allegedly gave ranchers a “big say” over the grazing programs, when in fact they were probably not under federal jurisdiction at all, but had sweeping powers granted by the state by Colorado v. Kansas. In turn, the newly minted states, being dirt poor, didn’t have the money or inclination to begin administering the grazing lands. The Forest http://www.newswithviews.com/Coffman/images/image15.gifService stepped into the gap. Without the states claiming states’ rights over grazing, grazing was in legal limbo. The ranchers, of course, didn’t understand that and thought the Forest Service had become their allies.[7]

The only thing required of the ranchers to get the benefits was to sign a contract with the Forest Service through their live-stock association.Low cost grazing permits helped them establish their prior rights.The contract gave the ranchers “advisory” status with perks with the Forest Service, when, in fact, the Forest Service most likely didn’t have any authority in the first place. Deceived, the ranchers loved it. For years they had good working relationships with the Forest Service.

When the Forest Service began to use the term prescriptive rather than preemptive in contracts the ranchers didn’t mind because the two words had the same legal meaning. Then the Forest Service began to exchange “prescriptive” to “prescription.” Ranchers apparently didn’t notice this change in the Forest Service contracts. Prescription terminology is right out of the philosophy of the forest reserves. Says Hage; “It is a denial of the prior appropriation water doctrine and the holding of the U.S. Supreme Court that grazers have an implied license to use the federal lands.”[8]

The ranchers found out the hard way that they were taken to the cleaners. Advisory boards do not have any legal force, and gradually the Forest Service began to tighten the screws on the ranchers. They were bound by the contract to adhere to the Forest Service’s prescriptions (i.e. management plans, grazing allocations, number of cattle, etc.)

Then came the lawsuits. Initially, the Forest Service used three obscure court cases; United States v. Tygh Valley Co., September 26, 1896; Dastervignes v. United States, March 2, 1903; and Dent v. United States, March 26, 1904 as the precedent in the U.S. District Court. Each of these three cases established their precedents before the 1907 Colorado v. Kansas Supreme Court case that denied the Forest Service’s water rights and established state sovereignty over the reserves. Nonetheless, the Forest Service used the cases as precedent. They skirted the 1907 Supreme Court decision by staying away from the grazing rights issue.

In an essay entitled “The Legal Aspect of the Grazing Problem” dealing with early grazing decisions based on these three decisions, Colorado Judge Ethelbert Ward specifically stated that these were essentially civil cases “by injunction” to prevent damage to property, “and would apply to the individual as to the United States. They are founded upon the law of the land, and do not depend upon rules and regulations.”[9] In other words, the issue was about damage to property, not grazing rights. Nonetheless, the cases were used as if they included grazing rights. They got away with it and grazing rights precedent in case law was established. Ward was attempting to expose the fraud being used by the Forest Service to claim jurisdiction over grazing using these three very inappropriate cases.

The Forest Service made sure the issue of preemptive rights never came up in the early U.S. District Court cases following Colorado v. Kansas, either because they were centered on property damage done by overgrazing, without discussing violations of grazing requirements at all, or the attorneys for the ranchers never brought up prior rights.[10] The cases circled around grazing without grazing actually entering into any decision.

There is one other important court case. In Shannon v. United States. Thomas Shannon, a Montana rancher opened a fence to allow his cattle to stray onto what was then the Little Belt Mountain Forest Reserve. He did not claim prior rights of water ownership, but did challenge the right of the federal government to regulate his livestock grazing on the forest reserve land in conflict with state grazing laws and the police power of Montana. Using precedent favoring the Forest Service from previous court rulings, U.S. District Court Judge William Hunt ruled in favor of administrative rights of the Forest Service on March 18, 1907. This is not surprising. Ranchers almost always lose in District Court.

Colorado Judge Ward (above) strongly disagreed basin his reasoning on the U.S. Constitution, not case law. Ward wrote in his essay:

Aside from exclusive state police regulations, there is another reason why the United States, as a landowner, cannot by rules and regulations, nullify state laws. It is that to these lands the federal government is not more than an individual land holder…. Hence the United States have no better rights than the individual land holder. This, I think, shows the error of Judge Hunt’s decision nullifying Montana Cattle laws.


The [state’s] enabling act is not a relinquishment of state sovereignty, it is only a relinquishment of claim to the title of the public lands; and a pledge not to tax nor to interfere with its primary disposal. Had the enabling act in specific terms relinquished state sovereignty and jurisdiction over public lands, such clause would be absolutely void and unconstitutional. The Supreme Court has so declared. (Italics and bold added)[11]

While the essay is not part of any case law, it once again demonstrates that despite all the confusing smoke and mirrors the U.S. District Court pontificates about federal rights using case law, the federal land ownership claims are fundamentally unconstitutional at the root. That is the basis that Utah, and perhaps very soon, other western states are working to sue the federal government to give them the federal public land they should have received when they became states. These include Wyoming, Idaho, Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado and Montana. South Carolina even passed a resolution supporting the transfer of public lands to the western states.

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The entire history of these court cases is spelled out by Hage, but is too complex and messy to be repeated here. At the risk of oversimplification the U.S. Forest Service changed the law by sucking the ranchers into contracts and then gradually changing the legal discussion from “preemption” to “prescriptive” to “prescription.” Once “prescription” language was embedded the Forest Service used a series of District Court cases; starting with the three pre-Colorado v. Kansas Supreme Court decisions mentioned above, then using each one to establish precedent for the next. This is called case law, not Constitutional law, and has done unbelievable harm to constitutional intent. Even so, the Forest Service was influenced sufficiently to begin issuing grazing permits only to ranchers who had preexisting rights, excluding those that did not.

Click here for part -----> 1, 2, 3, 4, 5,

Footnotes:

1. Pueblo Chieftain, May 15, 1907, Forest Service Law Office Correspondence, Record Group 49, Drawer 16, National Achieves. In: Storm over Rangeland, P. 168.
2. Wayne Hage. Storm Over Rangeland. (Merrill Press, Bellevue, WA, 1989). Pp 167-168.
3. W.J. Palmer to Pinchot, May 23, 1907, and also G.S. Arnold to T.E. Will, June 24, 1907. Both in Forest Service Law Office Correspondence, Record Group 49, Drawer 16, National Achieves. IN: Hage, P. 168-169.
4. Michael S. Coffman. Plundered, How Progressive Ideology is Destroying America. (EPI, Bangor, ME, 2013). Chapter 4.
5. Hage, P. 170.
6. Hage, P. 171.
7. Ibid
8. Ibid, P. 170
9. Forest Service Law Office Correspondence RG49, Drawer 16, National Archives. IN: Hage, P. 172.
10. Hage, P. 172.
11. Forest Service Law Office Correspondence RG49, Drawer 16, National Archives. IN: Hage, P. 172.

© 2014 Michael Coffman - All Rights Reserved

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THE BUNDY STANDOFF—A CENTURY OF ABUSE
PART 5

By Michael S. Coffman, Ph.D
July 19, 2014
NewsWithViews.com

Part V—Years of Tyranny Take Their Toll Leading to the Standoff

By 1916 Western ranchers began to realize the somewhat friendly relationship with the U.S. Forest Service was a fraud designed to trap them in contractswhichgave the government the right to set grazing requirements that would gradually put them out of business.

BY 1916 THE WORST FEARS OF THE RANCHERS started to materialize. Their stockmen’s associations began to be weakened by “eastern” professionals, usually foresters, which returned to the original objectives of the northern core interests. The Forest Service became uneasy because the banks were beginning to recognize the rancher’s grazing rights as real property. Says Hage, “Bankers loaned money on the collateral value of the entire ranch including range and water rights on the forest. When ranches were sold the range and water rights were a part of the ranch sale.”[1]

The Forest Service had to stop this or they would lose control of the entire http://www.newswithviews.com/Coffman/images/Text2.gif

An immediate 300 percent increase should be im-posed.”[2] Of course, easterners then, like urban¬ites now really do believe the grazing fees are ridiculously low. They have no idea of the enormous costs necessary to keep a herd healthy over sometimes tens of thousands of acres of land.

Tension continued to build. By 1925-26 stockmen were able to get several pro-ranching grazing bills introduced in Congress. Committee hearings garnered publicity unfavorable to the Forest Service. The Forest Service countered through the eastern conservationist press; just as is happening today. Heartwarming conser-vation stories were published in the American Forestry Society’s periodical, American Forests and Forestry. The New York Times, then as today, along with the Saturday Evening Post wrote negative stories about ranchers. Nothing, it seems has changed from then to now. One of those stories was written by Chief Forester Greely where he amaz¬ingly admitted the ranchers were prior users of grazing rights, while never sanctioning the claim as a vested right of property interest in forage. Relates
Hage:

Greeley referred to the ‘handful of stockmen and their leaders who were attacking the basic policy that governed the forest ranges.’ He condemned the demand by the stockmen that grazing rights be confirmed by laws as an attempt to secure special privilege for a few users who would then have the right to sell these privileges at high prices. Greeley pointed out that the Department of Agriculture had always recognized the rights of prior users of grazing lands. ‘It has never, however,’ he declared, ‘been able to sanction the claim to a vested right of property interest in forage. On the contrary, it has regarded that conception as absolutely inimical to the principles of conservation.”[3]

Progressives have always used emotion-laden words, not facts to make their case. That’s especially true today.Using deception, Greeley turned the only http://www.newswithviews.com/Coffman/images/Text3.giffact he used, vested right of property interest in forage, into the absolute enemy of conservation. A vested right is a constitutional right and Greeley made it out to be the most destructive thing in the world. The Forest Service did everything they could to deny ranchers havingprior rights or the state from getting control of their own grazing rights.

Suffice it to say that from a Constitutional standpoint, the states most likely had, and still have jurisdiction over grazing, not the Forest Service. Grazing rights remained in a legal quagmire. They still are. However, the states during this period finally passed extensive statutory water law to strengthen their control of water on the federal lands within their borders.[4]

Constitutionally, the western states should also be given the federal lands as per the Equal Footing Doctrine in the U.S. Constitution.However, there is a legal cloud over these issues because they have never been decided at the Supreme Court.
Circumstantial evidence suggests the cloud has been deliberately created and maintained by very powerful progressive judges and outside forces. It is suspected by many constitution advocates that these judges and outside forces don’t want this issue before the Supreme Court so they can rule with fuzzy case law that is stacked against the landowner.

The northern core panicked again in 1929 when President Hoover attempted legislation to privatize federal land. By that time the Forest Service’s appropriation had grown from less than a million dollars in 1905 when it was created to over fifteen million dollars. Privatization would destroy that growing bureaucracy and prevent the northern core from transferring its wealth into the pockets of the northern core industrialists. A major propaganda effort was launched and Hoover’s effort was stillborn.[5]

It is clear that the “resource damage” argument has been used since 1900 to “accomplish Forest Service objectives, without the dangerous issues of economic damage and the taking of private property without compensation,” claims Hage. “The Forest Service would be able to economically damage and take the property of uncooperative stockmen without raising the Fifth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution challenge with its guarantees of due process of law and just compensation.”[6]

That’s exactly what was happening to Wayne Hage in the 1980s. He was soon to find out the truth of his words as the enormous power of the Forest Service was to crash on his ranch as punishment for writing his 1989 book, Storm Over Rangeland. The ensuing legal battle lasted 24 years. He won all but one point of what is discussed above. Grazing rights.

Taylor Grazing Act of 1934—A Blessing and Curse

http://www.newswithviews.com/Coffman...n%20States.gifLands included in the Taylor Grazing Act of 1934.

Stockmen now had forty years of dealing with a federal government that seemed out to destroy them since the 1891 Forest Reserve Act. That Act dealt only with forest reserves. There was still nearly 250 million acres of non-forested land to deal with; 80 million acres of it was rangeland. The northern core and conservationists began to call for the creation of something like the Forest Service for the non-forested lands. It was ob¬vious to ranchers that the federal government and northern core were set on stripping them of their private property rights. Ranchers and western state interests demanded that express protection of property rights be engrained in any new legislation. That legislation was the Taylor Grazing Act of 1934.

The Act created the Division of Grazing, which was renamed to the U.S. Grazing Service. Eighty million acres of the 240 million acres were immediately placed in grazing allotments. On July 16, 1946, the Grazing Service and the General Land Office merged to form the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and moved into the Department of Interior.

Pre-existing water rights were specifically recognized in the legislation as were private investment in range improve¬ments as well as rights of ways and all other prior existing rights. Every section within the Act started with “Nothing within this sub-chapter” shall violate or diminish whatever previous property right the Act protected. State rights were protected with similar language in Section I. Virtually no water on the federal lands was unappropriated by 1934.

In spite of the specific language for other rights, the ranchers’ property rights for grazing rights still remained mixed, at best. The northern core was not that interested in prior rights on these lands because they believed no commercial minerals or forest resources would be found there. However, whatever legal decisions were made on BLM rangeland would be carried over to the Forest Service public land where it would directly affect them.

In retrospect, it is perhaps poetic justice that much of that BLM land could now be producing a bonanza of low sulfur coal, oil and natural gas in some of the biggest shale deposits in the world—if President Obama allowed it. As it is the Obama administration is only allowing a small portion of the BLM lands to open to oil development. It is significant to note that Bundy’s ranch is targeted by the BLM for mitigating alleged environmental damage done on other BLM land where oil, natural gas or solar energy development is occurring. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and his son are accused of trying to make huge profits off of Bundy’s ranch in these land deals.

Consequently, special interests funded by the northern core or their foundations have attempted to use the last sentence in Section III of the Act – “the creation of a grazing district or the issuance of a permit creates no right, title or interest in the land.” – as meaning the ranchers had lost their rights. However, courts have determined that the first sentence in Section III that the law could not diminish any rights whatsoever made it clear that the last sentence was meant for permittees having no prior rights. Even though northern core supporters failed, the argument is still used today as justification for their continued attacks.[7]

There are three types of permits. One for ranchers that who actually own http://www.newswithviews.com/Coffman/images/Text4.gifadjacent fee titled land and have pre-existing rights on the federal land. The second for ranchers having no fee land of their own, but still have pre-existing rights of their own on the federal land. The third has no pre-existing rights on federal land. Some special interest groups have tried to explain the pre-existing water rights do not imply grazing rights. They claim, explains Hage, “that the water rights are only valid as stock water rights when they flow on to the commensurable private lands. Therefore livestock grazing—which is proof of beneficial use—occurs on private, not federal land.”[8] Consequently, prior rights do not exist and grazing permits as a privilege, not a right.

This argument does not carry water either. Many streams, springs, and other water flowage never leave federal land and yet ranchers have preexisting rights to them. It does illustrate, however, the constant nuisance lawsuits by special interest groups funded by the northern core foundations that ranchers have to spend time and money to defend against. Hage provides summaries of some of the key District Court cases that are used as precedent that no grazing rights exist.[9] Notes Hage:

“These court decisions are often presented as proof that no pre-existing grazing rights were protected by the Taylor Grazing Act. But each of these cases plainly discuss grazing permits as revocable and non-compensable. They just as plainly do not mention water rights or in any way reference the proof of beneficial use for those waters. They do not discuss the prior appropriation doctrine or any rights that have “vested or accrued under existing law validly affecting the public lands.”[10]

Under the Taylor Grazing Act, as well as national forest regulations, permits were granted only to those who could prove they had valid prior rights. Bundy apparently has this chain of title. Hage correctly notes: “The rights were not created by the federal government and were clearly not revocable by the federal government.”[11] These court cases demonstrate that the Federal government had the right to revoke a permit, but not the underlying property rights. Such is the deliberately created confusion surrounding the split estate. Grazing rights remained in limbo.

The United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia in the 1938 case Red Canyon Sheep Co. c. Ickes came close to resolving the grazing rights, but stopped short of doing so, by merely saying the Taylor Grazing Act was passed to “define grazing rights and to protect those rights by regulation against interference.[12] That says nothing of value to clear away the fog.

These types of lawsuits systematically filed by special interest groups and funded by the northern core or their foundation proxies; create superfluous court decisions in which confusion is maximized and no clarifying legal resolution is reached. Hage adds, “Containment of the underlying property rights issue has primarily been accomplished by federal land management agencies by settling threatening disputes before they reach the federal courts.[13]

The Federal Land Management Act of 1976

The Federal Land Policy and Management Act (FLPMA) of 1976 was passed under what could only be described as an all-out and well financed campaign by environmental groups to pass it. Congress even had the hubris to claim out of thin air that the public lands belonged to the federal government: “Congress declares that it is the policy of the United States that the public lands be retained in Federal ownership; unless…it is determined that disposal of a particular parcel will serve the national interest.” Just because the government proclaims it, doesn’t make it so, especially if there is no constitutional provision for it.

The effort to pass FLPMA was funded by the same northern core foundations. The goal was to once and for all destroy any vestige of prior property rights held by ranchers. They used the same strategy as the Forest Service used in 1916; i.e. use the vague ambiguous mandate of the Act of June 4, 1897, “to protect the preserves,” as a basis to demand livestock reductions or costly management practices that served to increase the rancher’s cost-of-use. If pseudo¬science is used to justify livestock reductions (see part VI), while making it more expensive to operate, there would come a time when the rancher must go out of business. As in the case for 57 of Bundy’s fellow ranchers and those across the West, it is a brutally effective weapon.

It is important to understand that ranchers must demonstrate they and their predecessors have used their prior water rights continuously since the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. If they discontinue use for any reason, even when they no longer have cattle or sheep because the BLM or Forest Service successfully contrived to reduce herd size to nothing, they lose their prior water rightsafter a specified period of time. In other words, the rancher must make continuous use of his prior rights in order to keep them. Bundy claims he has that chain of title that gives him title.

Once lost, the prior rights go to the federal govern-ment. Wayne Hage v. the United States (Part VI) may change that but the federal government will make every attempt to stay away from that decision because the decision was such a disaster to them. The government, for all its criminal activity, gets off scot free. After all, they didn’t take the rights from the rancher as defined by the U.S. Constitution. They were merely “protecting” the resource. In other words, our government agencies have become an immoral mafia, dedicated to destroy ranchers.

The Politically Correct Defeat of Cliven Bundy

If enough attention is generated to create a public backlash against the abusive treatment of western rural ranchers and citizens, it is likely these northern core progressives will fail because of exposure and the realization they have no constitutional grounds to start with. The Bundy Ranch standoff might have generated that backlash, but the New York Times (NYT) deliberately edited a foolish talk by Bundy on Negros and slavery to make him sound like a raving racist. Although he certainly used the wrong choice of words, videos showed he was, in fact, trying to show how federal programs are hurting, not helping the black community; not unlike what they have done to ranchers.Several black leaders supported Bundy as being right. His comments, while crude and offensive, were in no way racist.

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While the NYT was shown to deliberately make Bundy into a rabid racist when he wasn’t, it was too late. Perception is everything and by the time the lie was revealed, the public had the perception that he was a racist locked in their minds. The NYT achieved its goal without any backlash against it for lying. Its hateful political correctness article, however, did cause conservative media to flee from Bundy like rats on a sinking ship; lest they be tainted by politically correct accusations of racism. Meanwhile Bundy’s civil rights were deeply violated in the BLM assault. Political correctness apparently now trumps constitutional rights. We are living in dangerous times.

The federalgovernment simply does not have any constitutional grounds to own those vast western land areas in the first place.However, because of the corruption of case law, unscrupulous lawyers have twisted constitut¬ional intent into something almost exactly the oppositeby usingDistrict Court case law. With this information, is easier to understand how Bundy’s losses in District Court mean nothing constitutionally and how most pundits and talking heads don’t have a clue what they are talking about. And yet, they blindly continue to support those who are producing the very food we require to live.

Click here for part -----> 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6,

Footnotes:

1. Wayne Hage. Storm Over Rangeland. (Merrill Press, Bellevue, WA, 1989).P. 175
2. Ibid, P. 175
3. William B. Greely, “The Stockmen and the National Forests,” Saturday Evening Post, November 14, 1925, pp. 10-11, 89, 82, 84. George F. Authier, “Both Sides of the Range Controversy,” American Forests and Forest Life, Vol. 31, December 1925, pp. 715-770. IN: Hage, P 176.
4. Hage, P. 181.
5. Hage, P. 178.
6. Ibid, P. 177.
7. Hage, P. 179, 183-184.
8. Hage, P. 185.
9. Mollohan v. Gray, 413 F. 2d 349, June 17, 1969; Acton v. United States, 401 F. 2d 896, October 4, 1968; United States v. Cox 190 F. 2d 293, June 21, 1951; Oman v. United States 179 F. 2d 738, Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals, December 19, 1949; Bowman v. Udall, 243 F. Supp. 672 (1965); Placer County Water Agency v. Jonas 275 Cal. App. 2nd 691, 80 Cal. Rptr 252 (1969); Fauske v. Dean, 101 N.W. 2d 769. (1960); United States v. Fuller 409 U.S. 488, Decided January 16, 1973.
10. Hage, P. 186.
11. Ibid, P. 187.
12. Red Canyon Sheep Co. v. Ickes, 98 F. 2d 308.Decided May 27, 1938 by the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.
13. Hage, P. 187.

© 2014 Michael Coffman - All Rights Reserved

http://www.newswithviews.com/Coffman/mike151.htm

THE BUNDY STANDOFF—A CENTURY OF ABUSE
PART 6

By Michael S. Coffman, Ph.D
July 19, 2014
NewsWithViews.com

Part VI—Environmental Extremism, and the Hage Victory

After creating the feudal/manorialism control over vast tracts of “public land” in the far West, a radical and bizarre form of environmentalism crept into natural resource colleges in the 1970s. By the 1980s our federal agencies began hiring these graduates and by the 1990s they were in mid- and senior management positions. Government bureaucracies were now poisoned with this radical environmental ideology.

Following the creation of the US Forest Service (USFS)in 1905 and Bureau of Land Management (BLM) in 1934, there has been an increasingly uneasy http://www.newswithviews.com/Coffman/images/Text5.gifworking relationship between citizens who make a living from the public land to produce our food, and the federal employees managing it. That relationship took a nosedive with the passage of the Federal Land Policy and Management (FLPMA) and the National Forest Management Acts (NFMA) in 1976.

Conservation Biology

Both Acts were pushed through Congress with enormous pressure by environmental groups, again funded by the decedents of the northern core. The Acts were heavily biased towards endless planning that has turned into a money pit sucking enormous amounts of taxpayer dollars to achieve environmental goals that are not necessary or are based in ideological pseudo science. Since then both agencies have had their personnel increasingly staffed with college grads steeped in environmental dogma that nature knows best and man is a cancer to the earth (For more information, see here, hereand here). It’s called conservation biology. In its first journal issue the purpose for existence of the Society of Conservation Biology was explicitly stated:

“The society is a response...to the biological diversity crisis that will reach a crescendo in the first half of the 21st century. We assume implicitly that...the worst biological disaster in the last 65 million years can be averted.... We http://www.newswithviews.com/Coffman/images/Text6.gifassume implicitly that environmental wounds inflicted by ignorant humans and destructive technologies can be treated by wiser humans and by wholesome technologies.”

This over the top arrogance is typical for diehard conservation biologists, many of them in our federal and state agencies. Worse, other writings and textbooks show that there is a belief in this group of activists that they are at war with society. This is especially true with ranchers because these ideological biologists have been taught in our finest universities that ranchers are destroying ecosystems. As a consequence, ranchers, timber companies and mining companies began to be singled out for deliberate destruction. Reality anchored in peer-reviewed research, however, shows that ecosystem health can be dramatically improved with cattle grazing and forest harvesting; even the much maligned clear cutting. As a Ph.D. in ecosystem analysis and management, this author is stunned at the blatant pseudo science and outright lies that are used to support this war against natural resource management.

For the first ten years or so, these newly minted conservation biologists were the low men and women on the totem pole in government agencies like the BLM. They had very little power to implement their extremely radical ideas. Outside observers were amazed at how quickly they were promoted into mid- then high-level positions. Many said it couldn’t be a coincidence. The increasing tyrannical nature being experienced by Bundy and other ranchers by the USFS and BLM is born in the extreme conservation biology movement, which is a very radical, even extreme, offshoot of environmentalism.

[Armed BLM storm troopers are not atypical. Ideological BLM personnel are noted for extreme reactions to perceived disobedience by ranchers (once officially called “biological resources.” Just as the militias and supporters of Bundy were very calm and disciplined compared to the BLM storm troopers, this rancher in 2002 kept his cool when the BLM agent was appeared about to shoot him in 2002. It is imperative that citizens remain calm when federal http://www.newswithviews.com/Coffman...%20Trooper.gifbureaucrats try to provoke them by so they have a reason to respond with force.
BLM hotheads actually did Taser some of the Bundy family without cause. Nowhere in the U.S. Constitution and the laws of Congress does federal agency personnel have enforcement rights, let alone carry arms to use against citizens, except in very specific instances. Section 701 (b) of the Federal Land Policy and Management Act of 1976 specifically forbids it. These agencies have just assumed this authority out of thin air. Source: Liberty Scene. © Jean Voigts 2002.]

It is literally quite bizarre. By 1994 a BLM internal working document prepared for a March 30 BLM summit on ecosystem management identified the objective/purpose of eco¬system management: "All ecosystem management activities should consider human beings as a biological resource..." Human beings are an biological resource? It’s absolutely sick. While shocking, it was a long time ago. Yet, how could it have even been written in the first place? The BLM is still implementing Ecosystem Management. The arrogance of the BLM, its relentless drive to destroy ranchers and resource users, and the raw use of overwhelming intimidation and force certainly suggests that in practice, the BLM is carrying out that goal.

Certainly at least some BLM personnel have been radicalized and are doing all it can to push people, especially ranchers, off of the public lands. Ask any ranching family in the West that actually has to make a living off the land. This accusation is unanimous. This is what Cliven Bundy is facing.

The seeming hatred for many BLM personnel for the ranchers automatically creates a deep adversarial relationship between the BLM and ranchers. That is only half the problem, however. The other half is the armed brute force the BLM (and Forest Service) uses to intimidate ranchers. As discussed in Part I, no federal agency has constitutional authority to administer police powers at the local level. Therefore the U.S. Federal Code does not allow it. 43 §1733(c)(1) specifically states:

When the Secretary determines that assistance is necessary in enforcing Federal laws and regulations relating to the public lands or their resources he shall offer a contract to appropriate local officials having law enforcement authority within their respective jurisdictions with the view of achieving maximum feasible reliance upon local law enforcement officials in enforcing such laws and regulations. (Emphasis added)

So where did the BLM (and every other federal agency) get the authority to arm 200 BLM jackboots and send them to intimidate and steal Bundy’s cattle? The answer is simple. They did it illegally. While that is hard to believe, these federal agencies have been gradually assuming unconstitutional powers since the 1990s so that today the media and most Americans assume they do have the constitutional authority to do to Bundy (and many more hapless victims) what they did. All they need is some kind of excuse to bring their boot down on the neck of a citizen.

In Bundy’s case the allegedly endangered Desert Tortoise is the chosen weapon to force him off the land, as was already done to the 57 neighboring ranches. Pseudo science and extreme environmentalist pressure was used to get the tortoise listed as endangered, and then implement “recovery plans” to continuously reduce the number of cattle that can graze the land while increasing fees, gradually strangling the ranchers until they were forced off their land.

The Desert Tortoise

While some good science comes out of conservation biology, usually this nature-based pseudo science usually gets everything backwards and turned inside out. According to their pantheistic ideology,[1] everything that man does is bad and has to be stopped. Like minded radical environmentalists in environmental groups lobby extremely hard to get an alleged endangered species put on the Endangered Species list. Once listed, draconian regulations can be implemented on property owners or lease holders, especially ranchers like Cliven Bundy where these species reside. There are literally dozens of alleged endangered species in name only that the BLM and USFS can use to hammer ranchers and users. In Bundy’s case every one of the 57 other cattle ranches in his county has been put out of business by the BLM using these and other strong-arm tactics.

http://www.newswithviews.com/Coffman...20Tortoise.gif[The Desert Tortoise is supposedly endangered because of overgrazing by cattle. That is a red herring. The tortoise thrives on cattle dung. The greater the number of cattle the greater the number of tortoises. Source: US Army Topographic Engineering Center]

For 40 years government report after government report blamed cattle for the decline of the Desert Tortoise. This is what Cliven Bundy and other ranchers have faced for decades. Yet, even before the Desert Tortoise was declared endangered, a major research study in 1990 clearly showed that Desert Tortoises actually flourish with cattle. The more cattle, the more tortoises. In the 1930s, before the 1933 drought hit, there were a record number of cattle grazing in Southern Nevada and Southeastern California. The Desert Tortoise was also at record numbers– at least 2,000 tortoises per square mile in Antelope Valley CA. Today, the BLM has forced ranchers to reduce their herds to 10 percent of what used to be on the rangeland. The result? The Desert Tortoise population has also plummeted; allegedly because of overgrazing according to the BLM. Not true. The 1990 research describes what is really going on:

The toothless tortoise is ill equipped to harvest and masticate range forage. The tortoise can harvest only tender vegetation, and it can't masticate even that. The tortoise can't process enough bulky, low analysis forage fast enough to meet its nutritional requirement… They solved this problem long ago—they allow other animals to do it for them. Desert tortoises feed primarily on dung. The more animals using the range, the more dung, which makes more food available for tortoises... The desert tortoise is well adapted for making use of cow dung.

Amazingly, the federal government does not even mention the tortoise’s diet of dung. Probably because it is not “natural” and destroys the narrative that cattle are responsible for the decline of tortoises. There was and is no empirical science to justify putting the Desert Tortoise on the Endangered Species list. It was purely political; based in bizarre pseudo science that is extremely destructive to the lives, liberties and happiness of thousands of property owners. Cliven Bundy is but one example. Wayne Hage is another.

The Wayne Hage Saga

As explained in Part II, Constitutional law is no longer taught in law schools. Attorneys are taught to use the U.S. District Court for federal administrative law used by the BLM and USFS. Because the District Court focuses on case http://www.newswithviews.com/Coffman/images/Text7.giflaw, not Constitutional law, the corrupted law is stacked against the landowner like Cliven Bundy.

Within a short time of buying the ranch in 1978, the U.S. Forest Service filed claim to the Hage’s water rights, fenced off critical springs, and eventually cancelled their grazing permits. The harassment and permit violations were unbelievable. Margaret Byfield (Hage), one of Hage’s daughters recounts:

They fenced off a major spring from our cattle and piped our water into their ranger station without our permission. In 1979, over a period of 105 days, we received 70 visits and 40 certified letters from the Forest Service citing us with various violations, most of which did not exist or were created by the Forest Service itself. I remember how one of these accused us of not maintaining our drift fences on Table Mountain. After two days riding the fence [by horse], one of our hands found the Forest Service flag marking a single missing staple. We were also charged with trespass citations where they claimed our cattle were in locations not permitted. They dropped these charges once they realized we had eyewitnesses watch Forest Service employees move our cattle into these areas, and then within hours notify us of the alleged offense. (Italics added)

By 1991 Hage was out of business. While Hage was rounding up his last cattle to sell, the USFS “brought in over 30 armed riders and gathered every cow they could find, which only amounted to 104 after two earlier roundups. Half the riders were armed with semi-automatic rifles and wearing bulletproof http://www.newswithviews.com/Coffman/images/Text8.gifvests.” Recounts Byfield: “when finished handed my father a bill for their confiscation expense.” The Gestapo tactics the USFS and BLM are doing to ranchers is well beyond belief for most Americans. It’s not an exaggeration. It is actually worse. The same types of attacks were suffered by Cliven Bundy and other ranchers for twenty years. All but Bundy were forced off their ranches rather than suffer this abuse.

Hage, however, had the chain of title to his water rights (vested rights) back to 1866 and 1874. Not surprisingly, the federal government had none. They couldn’t because the 1907 Colorado v. Kansas Supreme Court decision struck down any Forest Service right to water. Although unverified, it is reported Bundy has the same chain of title back to the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgowhich guarantees all property rights stay with the land owner and future owners.

Once the USFS took Hage’s cattle, killing at least one cow in the process, he had legal standing to go to the U.S. Court of Federal Claims (Claims Court) with a constitutional “takings” case based on the Fifth Amendment: “No person shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.” (Italics added) The Court of Federal Claims is authorized to hear primarily money claims founded upon violations of the Constitution, federal statutes, executive regulations, or contracts, express or implied in fact, with the United States.

Hage filed in the U.S. Court of Federal Claims as The Estate of E. Wayne Hage and the Estate of Jean N. Hage in 1992. During the next ten years the USFS filed numerous lawsuits against Hage, one of which was a felony charge. Only a few of them were found in favor of the USFS, and even those were reversed by the 9th Circuit Court on appeal.

In2002 that the Claims Court issued the first truly landmark ruling in the case. The Court determined that despite the government’s argument that the Hage’s had no property rights in the federal lands, the Court found they owned the water on the federal lands that flowed to their private lands, they owned the ditch rights-of-way that transported that water (and 50 feet on either side), and the range improvements.

One of the most important findings of the Court’s decision was that property rights owned by Hage were pre-existing to the permit system by the Act of 1866 and "the court is not of the opinion that lack of a grazing permit that prevents access to federal lands can eliminate Plaintiff's vested water rights and ditch rights." The favorite tool of the USFS and BLM was forcing the livestock off the ranch and then claiming the water rights when ranchers no longer could use and they expired.The decision had a chilling effect on the federal agencies. These were vested rights, just as Bundy is claiming.

As discussed in Parts II and III, vested rights had been passed in Congress as the Act of 1866 creating the “split estate” concept to handle these rights as granted by the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo with Mexico. In 2008, after issuing four opinions, the U.S. Court of Federal Claims finalized the 2002 preliminary ruling. Hage was granted $14.4 million in the settlement. The circuit judge, Loren Smith,in his ruling on the Hage case, likened federal ownership in the West as“feudal overlords.”As discussed in Part I, it is the very same landlord relationship that caused families to flee Europe to America from their “feudal overlords that owned the land they farmed.”

Feudalism is by its very definition a tyrannical system because the overlord, in this case the federal government, has control over the very land a family depends on for their day to day existence. In this case the overlord is being driven by ideology and enormous outside pressure to destroy the ranchers.

In one of the few losses in the case, the award of $14.4 million in compensation for the taking of the Hage’s water, rights-of-way and range improvements was reversed on a technicality by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in 2012. Now it appears that the United States Court of Federal Claims will not be granting the Plaintiffs a hearing to allow them to argue that only parts of the compensation claim were reversed.Once again, a federal agency gets off scot free from any accountability for their wrong doing. Well, almost. Fortunately, the ruling on property rights still stands, however.

Once that was accomplished, the case went back to District Court in U.S. v. Estate of E. Wayne Hage which now had a case law precedent. As explained in a Heritage Foundation summary, Judge Robert C. Jones on May 23 last year tells in his 104-page opinion the sordid and infuriating tale of a two-decades-long conspiracy among federal employees of US Forest Service in the Department of Agriculture and the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) of the Department of the Interior to deny the grazing rights of a Nevada ranching family, interfere with their water rights, and destroy their cattle business by scaring away their customers. In summary Jones’ used some ripping language in his decision:

“[T]he Government’s actions over the past two decades shocks the conscience of the Court.” The judge concluded that the government denied the renewal of the Hages’ grazing permit for a “nonsensical” reason that was “arbitrary” and “vindictive.” The employees of the BLM “entered into a literal, intentional conspiracy to deprive the Hages not only of their permits but also of their vested water rights.” The court held that the government had abused its discretion “through a series of actions designed to strip the Estate of its grazing permits, and ultimately to strip Defendants of their ability to use their water rights, for reasons unrelated to the appropriate use of the range or ensuring that historical grazing use is respected.”

Judge Jones issued an injunction against the federal government interfering with the Hage family’s water rights and ordered it to grant a grazing permit in accordance with the “historical usages and preferences” in that area of Nevada. The judge said he was restricting the government’s “normal discretion” in “this extreme case because of the conspiracy…and the obvious continuing animus against Hage by” government officials. Two government employees were held in contempt by the judge for sending trespass notices to people who leased or sold cattle to the Hages in order to “pressure other parties not to do business with the Hages, and even to discourage or punish testimony in the” case. The judge referred them to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for “potential prosecution for obstruction of justice.”

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Except for minor variations, this is exactly what has happened to Bundy. However, the Hage’s 2013 case had just been decided in May when Bundy’s last District Court case was decided in July. Since all testimony had been given in the Bundy trial, the judge in Bundy’s case couldn’t use the Hage ruling as case law. However, he could have used the Court of Federal Claims decision but didn’t, partially because the feds appealed it on technical grounds, which may have given Bundy’s U.S. District Court judge an excuse. Hage’s U.S. District Court Judge did use it.

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The state’s rights issue in which the 1891 Forest Reserve Act superseded the U.S. Constitution is still rift with controversy. The states hated it, but the consequences were very small then, so they didn’t fight it. Obviously, that has changed now and feeble attempts have been made to challenge it. However, most states are so full of progressive Attorney Generals and politicians who agree with the principle of federal sovereignty that there is no desire to fight it. Fortunately, that is not the case with Utah.The state of Utah is now in a battle to overturn this unconstitutional precedent and get all the so-called federal lands back to the state. It will take years, but the time might be finally ripe.Ranchers like Bundy have been fighting for their very livelihoods against the federal government for well over a hundred years. While it may “seem” to the average person like the federal government has the authority and is trying to do the right thing, it is not. Instead, it is a feudal arrangement that was forbidden in the U.S. Constitution by the Founders because they saw European examples that it always led to tyranny. Now there is an international agenda doing the same thing and it has already had devastating effects on every American citizen.

Click here for part -----> 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6,

© 2014 Michael Coffman - All Rights Reserved

http://www.newswithviews.com/Coffman/mike152.htm

thanks monty . so whats going on out there now ? not seen any news on them for some time

Mick, I am not aware of anything myself. I haven't spoken to any of the local ranchers recently. I will try and find out from some friends.

Pete Santilli Episode 945 – Wayne Hage Jr: Land Grabs, Jade Helm And What Is Really Happening In Nevada (Video)


Wednesday, April 1, 2015 14:09

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(Before It's News)





(N.Morgan) Operation Jade Helm has been all of the buzz the last couple of weeks in alternative media and the conspiracy world.




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Some believe this is preparation for war with Russia, but others believe this is the first step in a hostile take over of the United States by a tyrannical regime Hell bent on enslaving the populace.



Jade Helm Martial Law WW3 Prep Document 1







In this episode of the Pete Santilli Show, Pete talks to Wayne Hage Jr, is a Nevada Rancher has been fighting the government since 2007 when the BLM arrested him for trespassing on public lands which they deem Federal Property.

(NOTE: Actually Wayne's father, E. Wayne Hage began the fight about 30 years ago. Young Wayne has continued after his father's death)






Mr. Hage fought the charges and with the help Constitutional Sheriff Tony Damao the government was forced to back down.

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The BLM threatened Mr. Hage with military force and Sheriff Damao told the BLM that if they brought a SWAT team against one of his residents they would be met by “his” SWAT team.

Mr. Hage never had to face that SWAT team.


The two also discuss the Jade Helm exercise and how it could be connected to Land Grabs in 7 major Southwestern States.

It is not lost upon the people of these states that they are the most active when standing against the Federal Government.

Mr. Hage was present at the Bundy Ranch Standoff and supports the Bundy Family’s fight against the illegal seizure and militarized roundup of their cattle.


About Wayne Hage Jr:


Wayne Jr. has carried on where Dad left off. While he manages Dad’s estate as executor, he is also in charge of the estate’s litigation, pursuant to Dad’s instructions before his death.

Running the ranch since graduat- ing from Hillsdale College, Wayne worked closely with my father developing long-term plans for the ranch and litigation.






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The formatting left out the video in the above post. I am not going to edit it. I am posting it here.



http://youtu.be/mVS8GzX2_GY



Wayne Jr. Comes on about 1:07 in the video.

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Cliven and Carol Bundy of Clark County Nevada said their family was not prepared for the size, scope and intensity of the BLM’s operation or the response of their friends and neighbors across America, who they refer to as “We the People.” Courtesy photo

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“To me, the only reason the federal government would act this way is to have unlimited power. They want to assume the sovereignty, laws and land, and policing power. Not only do they assume these things, they believe they already have them. When they were challenged, their response was to show me I have none of these things,” began Cliyven Bundy of the reason behind the BLM’s (Bureau of Land Management) recent show of force against him and his family’s operation.



The history of grazing fees


It has been 20 years since Bundy paid a grazing fee to the BLM, a major point of contention to some. But the issue is far deeper and more complex than that single statement reads.


“There are multiple angles to explain on this topic. What I would like to express more than anything is that the BLM does not own the land. In other words, it is not federal land, it is state land. A lot of people, even ranchers, think they’re buying grass or pasture when they pay a grazing fee or permit, but that is incorrect. That grass is theirs by preemptive rights by beneficial use, and those rights began when that grazing use began – 137 years ago in my case. What you pay the BLM for is management and range improvements. Of every dollar spent on grazing fees, 12.5 percent is supposed to go the BLM for managing the land, and the other 80-some percent is supposed to come back to the land as range improvements. When you look at the law those are the only two purposes for your grazing fees.


“So, go back 20 years to when I quit paying grazing fees to the federal government. The administrative regulatory pressure at the time was being used to run myself and my neighbors out of business. They came along with a full force and effect decision on the basis of an endangered species, and said we couldn’t graze for three to four months in the peak of the spring. That was followed by another full force and effect decision that said the land was totally closed to grazing. In that process my neighbors, 52 ranching families in Clark County and hundreds of others across the Mohave Desert to the Pacific Ocean, were run out of business. I chose to send administrative notices to the solitary offices and BLM district office in Reno, Nev., stating I was not going to allow the BLM to manage my ranch out of business, and would not pay them for their management services anymore, and I didn’t,” said Bundy


Upon his decision to stop paying a fee and sign the associated contract, Bundy cleared himself of contract of law with the federal government as stated in the Constitution, eliminating any ties between himself and that government, he says.


“That is a difference between myself and most ranchers. Without a permit I can keep myself clean of their courts, and challenge them on the basis of state sovereignty, asking whether the federal government or the people of Nevada own the land in question. When they’re questioned in this manner, they either have to prove they have the authority, or the other side, Bundy in this case, wins. I consider Nevada a sovereign state with its own law and rights, which I abide by in full,” he said, adding he would have no issues paying a grazing fee to the proper authority of Clark County, Nev., which he has done. Bundy said he has submitted payment to the county. After cashing the check, the county tried to return it but Bundy did not accept the return and the county has the funds in their account as of today.


The blow up


“We have known about the BLM’s proposed roundup for some time, and their reasoning that we were not adhering by their codes or laws, giving them the right to remove our cattle,” said Cliven’s son Ammon
Bundy.
However, what the Bundy family was not prepared for was the size, scope and intensity of the BLM’s operation or the response of their friends and neighbors across America, who they refer to as “We the People.”


“Two things surprised me in this. One was that the government would spend that much, I think it was $3 million or more, on this project, and that they actually took over the policing power of the state and county and labeled us ‘domestic terrorists.’ I didn’t expect them to go to force with snipers, ground force and fully armed men. That was a little overwhelming,” said Cliven.


Ammon agreed, adding the agency brought about 200 vehicles, counting the contract cowboys and federal agents, into the area and set up what he referred to as a compound on March 27.


“The hills around the ranch were covered with agents and vehicles. You could see helicopters, vehicles on every road, and wherever there was a larger space between roads they had cameras set up. They literally had the whole place on lockdown, and everywhere they went it was a pack that included a contract cowboy, agents, and five to six armed vehicles following front and back. If anyone stepped off a road, they would immediately go and hassle them,” said Ammon.
Incidents between the BLM and Bundy supporters occurred with increasing frequency, and climaxed on Saturday, April 12 when 300-plus people and approximately 50 horsemen converged on the federal forces in a washout off I-15 with the intent of making them put down their weapons, release the Bundy cattle, and leave the area.
“The second thing that was surprising was how the people rebelled as a whole and said ‘no more’ to the point they actually faced the federal guns and moved them. What a story,” said Cliven.


It was the people, not the Bundy family, who insisted on the release of the cattle during a 9 a.m. public press conference that same Saturday between the local sheriff and the Bundys to discuss negotiations. Ammon explained that the sheriff was neutralized on the issue, and would not even respond to 911 calls placed by Bundy family members or their supporters during any of the altercations with the BLM personnel.


“The sheriff announced at the press conference, following its opening with a prayer and the pledge of allegiance, that the BLM was leaving the area and would stop collecting cattle, but needed a week to get out. There were between 1,500 and 2,000 people in attendance, and they are who raised the question of what would be done with the cattle already collected. The word was the BLM would not release those cattle, and the people wouldn’t have it.


“After a very short conversation back and forth, my father gave the sheriff one hour to communicate that to the BLM. When the cattle weren’t released the people literally got in their vehicles and drove up I-15 to the site where the cattle were held. They were met by approximately 100 fully armed agents dressed in full tactical gear, helmets and everything else,” said Ammon.


As seen in multiple online videos, the group peacefully and slowly converged on the BLM’s blockade, choosing to ignore threats that they would be shot if they came closer, and requests to have an individual come forward alone. Dan Love of Oregon BLM was the head officer, and met them at the portable panel fence with additional threats and attempts at manipulation, Ammon said.


“He was basically saying we needed to back down, and we were replying that we wouldn’t, and the entire time there were weapons on us from about 20 feet away. Then something very relieving happened – down the wash on the BLM side comes one of our sheriff deputies named Tom Roberts with a guard. He said he was there for us, tell him what we wanted him to do. I replied that short of not allowing us to finish what we came to do, we would follow his orders,” said Ammon.


Love “attempted to manipulate” Tom Roberts until Ammon loudly proclaimed that Love did not have any authority, but that Roberts was the authority of the people and who they would listen to, Ammon said.


“Roberts demanded the BLM back down and put their arms down, which they did. He asked us to back off also, then basically had a conversation with us asking what we wanted. We explained we wanted the BLM out of there, and that we would give them 30 minutes to get the first vehicle out. He relayed that and they began backing up and got their vehicles completely away from us. We were extremely happy. At 30 minutes they sent a single vehicle out, then at about 45 minutes to an hour the rest left in a convoy of 107 vehicles and fled to Utah,” said Ammon, adding they left generators running, personal belongings, vehicles and numerous other items behind in their haste to leave.


At that point the cattle were released and trailed down the wash and out of the BLM’s temporary corral.


“Traffic was backed up on I-15 for 80 miles for four hours. There were thousands of people lined up on the freeway and along the edge of the wash. When those cattle came down the people were hugging and cheering and crying – it was an amazing experience,” said Ammon.


Everyone followed the cattle back to the protest site, and immediately began celebrating their victory. But Ammon, his brother and a small group took the time to walk back to the wash and lay down the panels between the wash and the BLM’s compound.


“We took the time to quietly lay down probably around 100 panels to symbolize that our cattle were not going to be stolen, that our people would not have arms pressed against them and that we have freedoms and rights as Americans,” explained Ammon.


Cliven added that while intense, the people had no fear because they knew they were within their constitutional rights as well as those of the Lord.


Going forward


On a personal level, the Bundy family continues cleaning up the damage, caring for injured livestock, looking for additional sick, injured or dead livestock and taking note of the destruction of water lines, troughs and storage tanks. The BLM claimed to have gathered 384 head, but with the dead toll included, the Bundy’s have only recovered 352 head thus far. They remain uncertain whether there are additional dead on the property, they were hauled off the ranch or the BLM’s count was inaccurate.


Ammon said that watching his cattle gathered by helicopter at a run on 90-degree days, with no regard for their health or the separation of cows and their calves was particularly difficult on Cliven. While also a struggle for he and his brothers, Ammon said they were able to stay focused on their goal of breaking the federal government’s pattern of taking control of land and removing the people from it.


“We knew if the federal government was successful in locking down this land and oppressing us by force that it would never end. They drew the line, and we had to cross it. It’s about understanding and then standing for what’s right. You have to be willing to do whatever it takes to make it right. The fight is not just for you, your ranch or even your livelihood, it’s ultimately for our country,” he said.
Cliven added that the current problem in the western U.S. is the fact they have a contract with the federal government through grazing permits. Clearing those contracts and returning power to the sovereign states and counties is what he calls the first step in literally disarming the U.S. bureaucracy.


“The BLM and Forest Service people do not need to have guns. If they want to exercise their second amendment right and carry a gun, they should be able to. But they should not have a government issued weapon they carry to work when wearing their uniform. They work as public servants, and should be acting like boy scouts, not an army,” explained Cliven.


He said that if actions aren’t taken to reduce the power of the federal bureaucracy, he fears for civil war within the country.
“They are already the strongest army in the world – the army within America by the bureaucrats is. They are well armed and well outfitted with the finest equipment available. They just bought how many thousands of bullets, not to shoot at a foreign enemy, but to shoot at American citizens. We can’t allow that to happen,” said Cliven.


To begin the process, he suggested first eliminating any contracts a producer has with the federal government, then working with local and state governments to make necessary changes.


“Call your county sheriff and ask them to take those guns away. This is a big deal for our industry, it should be we the people of the states and counties that own this land, then as ranchers we have preemptive rights by beneficial use for grazing, just as others have similar rights for hunting, fishing, riding, mining, etc.” said Cliven.
Ammon said that he would classify the Bundy ranch as being about the “freest in the entire country,” right now, adding that as of the BLM pulling out it was reopened to 4-wheelers, camping, horseback riding and cattle grazing.


“Harry Reid has been threatening us all week with little comments. He’s calling us violent domestic terrorists, and has said, ‘something will happen,’ in a pretense that seems to want civil war. We are the Bundy Bunkerville ranch domestic terrorists, but we are also, ‘We the People,’ American ranchers who took control back, and we’re proud of it,” said Cliven.







Posted by Stephen Huls at 11:38 AM Email ThisBlogThis!Share to TwitterShare to FacebookShare to Pinterest





http://warningsforamericasfuture.blo...dy-family.html

http://warningsforamericasfuture.blogspot.com/2015/07/what-happened-before-standoff-bundys.html




What happened before the standoff??‏ Bundy's explain.



Carol Bundy

3:55 PM
07/06/2015

What happened before the standoff??‏ Friends, I recently discussed the events that led up to our confrontation at Bundy Ranch with the BLM on the Western Freedom Forum podcast. I explain in detail what grazing 'rights' are and how they are established and how the BLM is claiming they own these rights despite my family having spent generations establishing our grazing rights according to the law here in Nevada and I'll explain what the BLM did to every other rancher in our area. This podcast is hosted by Darin Bushman who was with us that day along with a number of people from Utah. Darin is also a County Commissioner in Piute county Utah. He started this podcast to bring attention to the many situations we are dealing with in the West. If you want to keep up I'd recommend you subscribe. It is available on iTunes and Stitcher. Please share with your friends, we need to educate everyone. Ammon https://blu178.mail.live.com/Handler...1995cdb4e6.png Click the image above to listen to the interview http://www.westernfreedomforum.com/?p=46 http://warningsforamericasfuture.blo...ff-bundys.html

Adverse possession is not agreeable possession. If the BLM agreed there would be no dispute.

Levant et couchant means you spent the night and woke up to see the morning sun. This French phrase is generally applied to neighbors domestic animals that come to visit but it applies to the neighbor as well.

Had I been the BLM manager I believe I would have sent Mr Bundy a nice offer which he couldn't refuse ... that his rights to graze were established by long usage but extended to him only during his lifetime. Nothing inheritable in the grazing right. 'Course this would simply be an offer. They seem more intent upon establishing his adverse possession though and have done a fairly good job of providing evidence of it.

Rights are highly transitory. If you fail to assert them then you have none.

Ramona Hage Morrison (cousin to my brother's wife) quotes Federal Judge "BLM engaged in criminal conspiracy"

http://youtu.be/vooz--PPHQ8

http://youtu.be/vooz--PPHQ8

Quote:

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Originally Posted by monty

Ramona Hage Morrison (cousin to my brother's wife) quotes Federal Judge "BLM engaged in criminal conspiracy"

http://youtu.be/vooz--PPHQ8

http://youtu.be/vooz--PPHQ8

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On Jan. 16 the 9th Circuit Court overturned this decision and remanded the case back to the District Court stipulating it must be heard by a different judge.

Wayne Hage is a pro se defendant. I believe he is challenging the Court's constitutional authority to take jurisdiction.

thanks monty for the updates

Donald Trump Presidential Campaign Leader… ARRESTED!

http://www.thepoliticalinsider.com/w...6/03/1tr-1.jpg
In unexpected news, Tea Party activist and Co-Chairman of Veterans for Donald Trump has been arrested!

Jerry Deemus is in trouble with Federal authorities for his alleged connections to Cliven Bundy, and faces 9 charges, including conspiracy to commit an offense against the U.S., threatening and assault of a federal law enforcement officer, extortion, and firearm charges!

He is scheduled to be arraigned later today in U.S. District Court in Concord.
The 64-page indictment cites DeLemus as one of eight defendants who “planned, organized, led, and/or participated as gunmen in the assault, all in order to threaten, intimidate, and extort the officers into abandoning approximately 400 head of cattle that were in their lawful care and custody.”

Court papers describe DeLemus as a “mid-level leader and organizer of the conspiracy,” who recruited, organized, trained and gave logistical support to gunmen and followers. He is alleged to have been a leader and organizer of armed patrols and security checkpoints on the Nevada ranch. DeLemus first traveled from New Hampshire to Nevada on April 10, 2014.
The indictment stems from the massive armed assault against federal law enforcement officers in and around Bunkerville, Nev., on April 12, 2014, which court records refer to as a conspiracy to thwart the seizure and removal of Cliven Bundy’s cattle from federal public lands. Bundy was under a federal court order to remove his cattle from the public lands since 1998. Two more court orders came in 2013, when led to an impoundment process and armed standoff and alleged assault.

Via New Hampshire Union Leader

http://www.thepoliticalinsider.com/w...16/03/33-1.jpg

What do you think about Deemus’ arrest? Please leave us a comment (below) and tell us what you think.


http://www.thepoliticalinsider.com/prominent-trump-campaign-leader-arrested/?utm_source=SailThru%26utm_newsletter&utm_medium=e mail&utm_campaign=TPI%20Newsletter%2003-04-16%20Tier%201&utm_term=Tier%201

Quote:

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Originally Posted by monty

Donald Trump Presidential Campaign Leader… ARRESTED!

http://www.thepoliticalinsider.com/w...6/03/1tr-1.jpg
In unexpected news, Tea Party activist and Co-Chairman of Veterans for Donald Trump has been arrested!

Jerry Deemus is in trouble with Federal authorities for his alleged connections to Cliven Bundy, and faces 9 charges, including conspiracy to commit an offense against the U.S., threatening and assault of a federal law enforcement officer, extortion, and firearm charges!

He is scheduled to be arraigned later today in U.S. District Court in Concord.
The 64-page indictment cites DeLemus as one of eight defendants who “planned, organized, led, and/or participated as gunmen in the assault, all in order to threaten, intimidate, and extort the officers into abandoning approximately 400 head of cattle that were in their lawful care and custody.”

Court papers describe DeLemus as a “mid-level leader and organizer of the conspiracy,” who recruited, organized, trained and gave logistical support to gunmen and followers. He is alleged to have been a leader and organizer of armed patrols and security checkpoints on the Nevada ranch. DeLemus first traveled from New Hampshire to Nevada on April 10, 2014.
The indictment stems from the massive armed assault against federal law enforcement officers in and around Bunkerville, Nev., on April 12, 2014, which court records refer to as a conspiracy to thwart the seizure and removal of Cliven Bundy’s cattle from federal public lands. Bundy was under a federal court order to remove his cattle from the public lands since 1998. Two more court orders came in 2013, when led to an impoundment process and armed standoff and alleged assault.

Via New Hampshire Union Leader

http://www.thepoliticalinsider.com/w...16/03/33-1.jpg

What do you think about Deemus’ arrest? Please leave us a comment (below) and tell us what you think.


http://www.thepoliticalinsider.com/prominent-trump-campaign-leader-arrested/?utm_source=SailThru%26utm_newsletter&utm_medium=e mail&utm_campaign=TPI%20Newsletter%2003-04-16%20Tier%201&utm_term=Tier%201

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My shocked face :-O

The government Brownshirts trying to discredit Trump any way they can.

http://lasvegassun.com/news/2016/mar...urt-appearanc/

Cliven Bundy makes initial federal court appearance in Las Vegas


http://s19.postimg.org/qtuforqhv/image.jpg

L.E. BASKOW

Cliven Bundy takes a moment to ponder a question from a supporter during the Bundy Ranch Liberty Celebration near Bunkerville on Saturday, April, 11, 2015.


By Ken Ritter, Associated Press
Published Friday, March 4, 2016 | 4:19 p.m.

Updated Friday, March 4, 2016 | 8:26 p.m.

http://s19.postimg.org/e3q7boijn/image.jpg

MULTNOMAH COUNTY, ORE., SHERIFF''S OFFICE / AP

This Wednesday, Feb. 10, 2016, booking photo provided by the Multnomah County, Ore., Sheriff''s office shows Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy.


The renegade rancher at the center of a states'-versus-federal rights fight made his first appearance in custody before a U.S. judge in Las Vegas on Friday, but wasn't asked to enter a plea.



Similar federal court hearings were held in Idaho and Utah, a day after authorities rounded up 12 people in five states, raising to 19 the number accused of inciting and leading an armed insurrection in April 2014 to stop a roundup of cows from public land near Cliven Bundy's ranch.

Bundy, 69, stood with a deputy federal public defender at his side as he heard the 16 charges against him including conspiracy to commit an offense against the United States, assault on a federal officer, threatening a federal officer, obstruction of justice, interference with interstate commerce by extortion and several firearms charges.

Asked by the judge if he could afford to hire an attorney, Bundy said he hadn't had a chance to talk with anyone about that.

He was returned in custody in recent days to Nevada from Oregon, where he'd been held following his arrest Feb. 10 as he arrived at Portland International Airport to visit two of his sons jailed during the occupation of a federal wildlife refuge.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Carl Hoffman said Bundy would remain in custody until at least next Thursday. The time will let him hire a lawyer or file revised financial disclosure forms.

The judge expressed doubt about whether a report that Bundy filed in Oregon qualifies him for a lawyer at federal expense.

"I don't think it is entirely complete, from what I know about this case," he said.
Bundy has a 160-acre ranch and melon farm in Bunkerville, about 80 miles northeast of Las Vegas. A descendant of Mormon settlers who heads a family of 14 children and more than 50 grandchildren, he claims homestead rights and refuses to acknowledge federal authority over arid Virgin River valley rangeland around his property.
He has represented himself in previous local, state and federal legal proceedings.

The 2014 showdown came after federal land managers obtained federal court orders to remove Bundy cows from environmentally fragile public land in the scenic and rugged Gold Butte area. The area is pocked with scrub brush, mesquite, cheat grass and yucca.

Federal agents and contract cowboys herding cattle toward a corral were stopped by a picket line of self-styled militia perched on a high Interstate 15 bridge, pointing military-style AR-15 and AK-47 weapons at them.
Officials said at the time that Bundy owed more than $1.1 million in fees and penalties for grazing illegally for about 20 years. A more recent accounting hasn't been made public.

The battle with the federal Bureau of Land Management made Bundy and several of his adult sons well-known as outspoken advocates for states' rights.

The dispute predates statehood in some places, and calls for action have gotten louder as federal agencies designate protected areas for endangered species and set aside tracts for mining, wind farms and natural gas exploration.

The latest wave has roots in the Sagebrush Rebellion, which began more than 40 years ago over grazing rights in Nevada.

The arrests on Thursday of 12 alleged co-conspirators in Arizona, Utah, Idaho, Oklahoma and New Hampshire came after a federal grand jury in Las Vegas expanded an indictment filed Feb. 11 against Bundy.

It also named Bundy sons Ammon, Ryan, Melvin and David Bundy, and four other men already in federal custody following the end of the 41-day standoff at the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in eastern Oregon. They are Ryan Payne of Montana, Peter Santilli Jr. of Cincinnati, and Brian Cavalier and Blaine Cooper, both of Arizona.

"They're just rounding up all of us," said Susan Hardy, a Bundy relative from Mesquite, Nevada, who attended David Bundy's court appearance in U.S. District Court in Salt Lake City.

"We're just standing for America. We're standing for our freedom," she said.

© Las Vegas Sun, 2016, All Rights Reserved

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Similar federal court hearings were held in Idaho and Utah, a day after authorities rounded up 12 people in five states, raising to 19 the number accused of inciting and leading an armed insurrection in April 2014 to stop a roundup of cows from public land near Cliven Bundy's ranch.

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Hmmm.....so his cows were on public land after having permission to be on that public land which of course could be legally revoked at any time (and was). So the moron leads and incited an armed rebellion to stop his property from being rounded up on public land.
Poor little Mr. Bundy...he wanted his cake and eat it too.
Look what greed got him......16 charges in a federal court........equals dumb ass of the year!!!


Its not like the government didnt tell him before hand to get his cows in order.....he chose to ignore them orders to remove his property. He had it good getting free grazing for his cow on public land until that contract was fullfilled and executed by the government.
Stupid is what stupid does........jail his ass and through the key away.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by 7th trump

...and through the key away.

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Geee ... you were on such a good rant and then had to blow it all because you don't know how to spell THROW!!!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by palani

Geee ... you were on such a good rant and then had to blow it all because you don't know how to spell THROW!!!

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You should know by now that accuracy is the least of his concerns.