| Kasz216 said: Although the Equal Footing law you would think would disagree except for the odd Supreme court belief that it applies only to Soverinty laws and land that exists under water. Even though extending it to land underwater aknowledges that it originally appled to land on the ground.
I mean, how you can makle the arguement that not holding soverinty over your land doesn't effect your states soverinty... I don't know. |
Subterranean rights and surface rights have a long history of being legally distinguishable, stretching back to long before the Constitution was created, usually centered around water and mineral rights. It is by no means a difference without a distinction, or a modern creation. In fact, we are still the only country where ownership of the surface land presumptively gives you ownership of the subsurface; prior to the formation of our country, the king/sovereign owned everything under the surface, unless he expressly ceded it to you, a situation which persists everywhere else on Earth.
For the last included statement, the answer is simple: because the state contractually agreed to that exact arrangement, including giving the federal government exclusive power over federal land. This argument is akin to saying that no country is truly sovereign because they've ceded land to other nations in the form of embassies or military bases. If the states want to change this arrangment, they merely have to have their congressmen pass a law ceding/selling/otherwise transferring federal land to the state governments, as Congress has the exclusive right to deal away federal land. Or they can amend the Constitution to do away with the Property Clause for good. I infer from the fact that neither has happened that a majority of the states do not see this as a major impediment (and in fact many states covet some federal land ownership for the economic benefit it can provide).
