The State of Louisiana and others protested the issuance of any oil or gas lease by the United States of East Timbalier Island and adjoining islands off the coast of Louisiana on the ground that the State owned the islands. As a result of the action of the waters of the Gulf of Mexico and the elements, East Timbalier Island, during the hundred years of its known history, has advanced about 24 miles in a northerly direction, a distance of nearly 15 times its present average width. And while the contour of the island has changed, and several segments have broken away to become small islands, the principal island has maintained its substantial identity. Ever since 1837 the island has been and still is being treated by the United States as its public land. Until it protested in this case, Louisiana never asserted ownership or jurisdiction and never repudiated the ownership and jurisdiction of the United States. The conduct of Louisiana and its lessees has been inconsistent with ownership by the State. Held: The islands are public lands of the United States and the protests should be overruled. 56-354 The laws of the United States alone control the disposition of title to its lands and the States are powerless to place any limitations or restrictions on that control. 57-228 As long as public lands remain under the care and control of the Land Department (Interior Department), its power to inquire into the extent and validity of rights claimed against the Government and to correct its own errors does not cease. When alienation of public land is involved, the Secretary may determine every question presented by the case rec656477-63 vol. 52-24 ord without regard for the manner in which the case comes before him for determination. 58-275 The Secretary of the Interior is under a duty to determine whether lands applied for are vacant public lands and subject to disposal, or whether they have been previously reserved, granted, or sold. Pursuant to such determination, he may order a resurvey of lands believed to be public lands. But the record in this case does not indicate an adequate basis upon which the Secretary could properly determine that the lands applied for were public lands which should be resurveyed and disposed of as public lands. 60-129 Where a statute authorizing the purchase by the United States of lands and mineral deposits provides that the properties "when acquired" shall become a part of the public domain subject to the applicable public-land mining and mineral leasing laws, the date upon which the lands and mineral deposits become a part of the public domain is determined by the date of acquisition. 60-220 VI. LEASES AND PERMITS Regulations of Aug. 22, 1928, leasing of public lands for airports and aviation fields under act of May 24, 1928 (45 Stat. 728). (Cir. No. 1161.) 52-476 Lands in producing oil and gas fields or covered by oil and gas leases are not subject to entry under any of the public land laws. 52-620 The authority conferred upon the Secretary of the Interior by section 15 of the Taylor Grazing Act to lease isolated or disconnected tracts of public land is limited to "vacant, unappropriated, and unreserved lands", and, having become reserved by the operation of the Executive withdrawal order of Nov. 26, 1934, may not be leased so long as that order remains in force. 55-205 In the absence of specific statutory authority, Government officers have no power to lease public lands. 59-313 As the date of the appropriation of the purchase price becomes the date of acquisition by the United States and the date upon which the acquired properties become a part of the public domain, any lease made prior to that date under the leasing laws applicable to the public domain would be without authority of law. 60-220 VII. RIPARIAN RIGHTS Where in a Government survey a body of water, navigable or nonnavigable, was meandered with a fair degree of accuracy and the abutting lands subsequently disposed of according to the plat, title to lands that thereafter appear beyond the meander line is dependent upon the laws of the State within which they are situated. 52-307 Where swamplands abutting upon a meander line are patented to a State in accordance with the plat of survey, the State does not acquire title under the swampland grant to lands beyond the meander line, subsequently uncovered by the recession of the waters, but it takes such riparian rights by virtue of its patent as are recognized by local law. 52-307 In the State of Iowa a riparian owner takes title only to the water's edge of streams or other bodies of water, whether navigable or nonnavigable and Government patents for marginal lands follow the State rule and convey no land under a nonnavigable lake. 53-429 The United States does not retain the ownership of the beds of streams or other bodies of water, whether navigable or nonnavigable, after the marginal uplands have been disposed of without reservations or restrictions, and the extent of riparian rights is governed by local law. Hardin v. Jordan (140 U. S. 371). 53-429 Following Federal survey, certain undisposed of subdivisions of United States public lands in Nebraska bordering upon the Missouri River were washed away by that river, either as the result of erosion or avulsion, and later restored, augmented by other land, the result of accretion. Held, That title to the surveyed lands so restored or uncovered and to the lands added thereto by accretion is in the United States and not in the owners of the back lands which were for a time the shore lands. 54-455 Public land reserved by the United States, until disposed of by it, and in the absence of express legislation by Congress, is governed by the common law with respect to riparian rights and the effect of erosion and submergence, and not by the law of the State (Widdecombe v. Rosemiller, 118 Fed. 295). 54-455 Where surveyed public lands of the United States bordering upon a navigable stream, and to which the United States has not parted with title, are eroded in their entirety by the action of the stream, and later restored by accretion, title to the lands so restored is in the United States, and not in the owners of the remote nonriparian lands, which lands for a time were the shore lands. 54-455 In surveys by the United States Government, the meander lines which are run along or near the margins of streams or lakes are for the purpose of ascertaining the area of the upland, and not for the purpose of limiting the title of the grantee to such meander lines, the waters themselves constituting the real boundary. 55-310 In the case of navigable waters, the submerged lands do not belong to the Federal Government, having passed to the State upon its admission to the Union. In the case of lands bounded by nonnavigable waters, title to the submerged lands is surrendered if the patent for the marginal uplands issues without reservation or restriction. In either case, the effect of the grant on the title to the submerged lands will depend upon the law of the State where the lands lie. 55-310 In the State of Michigan, in the absence of words of reservation or restriction, or unless the contrary appears, a grant of land bounded by a water course conveys riparian rights, and the title of the riparian owner extends to the middle line of the lake or stream. The shore proprietor takes by virtue of shore ownership, and his interest in the bed of the lake or stream is acquired as appurtenant to the grant, the extent of his interest depending upon his frontage and the form, length, and breadth of the body of water upon which his land abuts. 55-311 The Desert Land Act, passed Mar. 3, 1877 (19 Stat. 377), left with each State the right to determine for itself to what extent the rule of appropriation or the common law rule in respect to riparian rights should obtain; does not bind or purport to bind the States to any policy; and simply recognizes and gives sanction, insofar as the United States and its future grantees are concerned, to the State and local doctrine of appropriation, and seeks to remove what otherwise might be an impediment to its full and successful operation (California Oregon Power Co. v. Beaver Portland Cement Co., 295 U.S. 142). 55-371 The Government, as riparian owner of lands in California, is recognized as entitled to such water as is needed for beneficial use, but the law of appropriation permits only such quantity as is beneficially used. 55-371 The right to the use of water from springs located on lands of the United States not withdrawn for public watering purposes may be acquired by use on riparian lands of the United States, or by appropriation under State laws, subject merely to prior vested rights. 55-372 Where, prior to the admission of a Territory to statehood, an Indian reservation located therein had been established by the United States which included lands on both sides of a river traversing a portion of the reservation, and after the admission of the State into the Union an island formed in said river, the island is a part of the reservation and its status Indian property, and not the property of the State. 55-475 Evidence held sufficient to show that land along the Missouri River was formed by accretion and not avulsion. Lands along the north bank of the Missouri River in North Dakota, held under patent to a railroad company, are riparian in character and the south boundary thereof is the river and not the meander line. The owner of such land under the laws of North Dakota is the owner of the accretions in front of his lots to the present north bank of the river. 56-300 Under the law of North Dakota, where the State owns the land in the bed of a navigable river, the ownership of land in North Dakota, which has accreted from the bed to the banks of the river, becomes vested in the owner of the riparian lands. 59-415 Where, prior to the entry and patent of a lot of public land abutting on a meander line, a substantial accretion had formed between the meander line of the lot and the actual shoreline of the Missouri River, title to the added area did not pass under a patent for the surveyed upland. 59-415 The general rule for establishment of side lines to divide alluvium between adjoining riparian owners along a river is to give each proprietor such proportion of the new shoreline as he had of the old shoreline. This is appropriately accomplished by measuring the whole ancient line of the river affecting the area involved and computing the portion of that line owned by each riparian proprietor; then measuring the whole length of the new shoreline and appropriating to each proprietor such portion of the new line as he had of the old line; and then drawing the side lines from the points at which the proprietors bounded on the old line to the points of division thus determined on the new line. Such accretion side lines do not generally run cardinal to the survey lines. This rule is followed in North Dakota. 59-416 VIII. SPECIAL GRANTS According to the plat of survey of 1845 two tracts of public land in Arkansas had for their east boundary the west bank of the Mississippi River. Between 1843 and 1880 the waters of the river gradually eroded and submerged all of the land within the tracts and land to the west thereof and the main channel of the river ran west of the tracts, but following this submergence, land in the form of a sand bar reappeared within the boundaries and to the full extent of the tracts, the reappearance being caused by the westerly recession of the waters and by accretion to private land in Tennessee which in 1880 had attained an elevation of from 5 to 10 feet above the river. By an avulsive change in the course of the river in 1912, the main channel of the river ran southeast of the land. The boundary of the Mississippi River between Arkansas and Tennessee was fixed by the Supreme Court on June 3, 1940. A supplemental survey by the General Land Office disclosed that but 2.02 acres of one of the tracts were in Arkansas, the remainder of the two tracts being in Tennessee. In April 1934 homestead entry was allowed for the two tracts according to the original plat of survey, which subsequent to the filing of supplemental plat of survey was reduced to the 2.02 acres remaining in Arkansas. Held: (1) That the reappearance of the land was the result of gradual accretion to the land in Tennessee before the avulsive change in the river channel and the avulsion was not the cause of its reappearance. (2) That when the land became a part of the bed of the Mississippi River, the title thereto became vested in the State or States within whose boundaries it was situated, and upon its reappearance, the title to the land was governed by the State law. (3) That neither the laws of Arkansas nor Tennessee, as interpreted by its highest court, afford sufficient basis for holding that the reappeared land became the property of the United States, and if the Department should so hold, its holding would not bind an adverse claimant. (4) That considering the act of Aug. 7, 1846 (9 Stat. 66), ceding to Tennessee the public land south of the Congressional Reservation Line and the legislative history of the act, it is believed to have been the intent and purpose of Congress, in order to settle all controversy with the State and to rid the Federal Government of all administration of the remnants of public lands in the State, to divest itself of all ownership and jurisdiction over the public lands in Tennessee at once and forever, and though the act of cession at the time of its enactment passed the title only to the land ceded by North Carolina, it seems improbable that it was the intention that the United States was to retain its ownership and apply its system of disposition under the public land laws to such small fragments of public lands in Arkansas that were washed away by gradual changes in the channel of the river, but subsequently reappeared in the State of Tennessee. (5) That it had not been satisfactorily shown that either the lands in Arkansas or Tennessee are public lands subject to disposition under the public land laws, and there was no sufficient reason for surveying any part of them as such. 58-242 The act of Aug. 7, 1946 (60 Stat. 872), was a remedial statute, conferring certain rights upon the persons intended to be benefited thereby. But the act does not deprive them of any rights they might have under any other laws of Congress. 60-184 Since the question as to the treatment to be accorded to the equitable claims of the supposed owners of the public lands in the Oklahoma panhandle south of the Cimarron base line was for many years the subject of congressional consideration, those persons were not required by Cir. 932, 43 CFR 192.48, to anticipate the ultimate congressional decision by filing an election to make future homestead entry on the land with reservation of the minerals to the United States. 60-185 IX. SPECIAL USE PERMITS The provision of 43 CFR, Cum. Supp., 258.2 is valid, and, in the absence of congressional intent to the contrary, the issuance of special land-use permits is not restricted to cases in which there is no statute at all governing the type of use desired. 59-313 Special-use permits are not issued by the Department for withdrawn lands not avail 351 352 PUBLIC RECORDS (See also Confidential Information) A map required to be filed by a railroad company does not become a public record until its approval by the Secretary of the Interior and where it is necessary to reject a selection of a tract of public land for station grounds under the act of Mar. 3, 1875, because the land had been patented to another, a map cannot be accepted officially and filed as evidence of the company's use and occupancy of the tract applied for. 52-571 Land selected as an allotment by a qualified Indian is land "disposed of" within the contemplation of section 1 of the act of Mar. 3, 1927 (44 Stat. 1401) so long as the selection remains of record and no occasion arises to disturb it. 52-689 The fact that the records of the Land Department show that a tract of public land is free from claim of any kind is not conclusive that the land has not been validly appropriated under the mining laws. 54-47 Where an act of Congress authorizing a correcting of land title records does not specify the method of correction, but merely requires that the records be so corrected that they shall show title in the occupant, and the purpose of the act is in effect to divest the United States of claim of title, a quitclaim deed is within the authority of the act and suffices. 55-479 Subordinate officers of the Department having custody of official records are authorized by the act of Aug. 3, 1950 (64 Stat. 402), to furnish copies of such records to persons outside the Department, and to authenticate such copies when appropriate, and this authority is not affected by section 1(a) of Reorganization Plan No. 3 of 1950. 60-449 Subordinate officers of the Department having custody of official records are subject, in the exercise of the authority vested in them by the act of Aug. 3, 1950 (54 Stat. 402), to the supervision of the Secretary of the Interior and to the pertinent regulations issued by the Secretary. 60-449 II. Applications-- III. Award of Lands__ IV. Isolated Tracts__. VII. Sales Under Special Statutes__ I. GENERALLY 353 353 Regulations of Apr. 7, 1928, offerings at public sale-section 2455, Revised Statutes, as amended (Cir. No. 684). 52-340 Offerings of Mar. 5, 1930, at public sale. Cir. No. 1207. 53-53 Sale of public lands being in terms forbidden by the Executive withdrawal of Nov. 26, 1934, isolated and disconnected tracts thereof may not be sold at public auction under authority of section 14 of the Taylor Grazing Act. 55-206 The right to apply for public sale of public lands as conferred by section 14 of the Taylor Grazing Act is not a right to such sale, the propriety thereof being discretionary with the Secretary of the Interior. The previous filing of an application for purchase as an isolated tract (Rev. Stat. sec. 2455, as amended; 43 U.S.C. 1171) did not create a "valid claim" so as to except the land from a proclamation establishing a national forest, nor did it affect the authority of the President to include the land in the national forest; consequently, the promulgation of the proclamation precludes favorable action on the previously filed application. 59-254 Sale of land held to be in the public interest where it is public land extending into a general area of privately owned land, but only if the purchaser also buys certain |