Written by Dallas Hyland
Last week on the Kate Dalley show, where I am a regular weekly co-host, she asked me a pointed question during a debate over federal oversight of public land.
She asked me why I was taking sides with the federal government over the state.
The question couches the debate in an us-against-them fashion prevalent here in Utah and a few other states. But it has a faulty premise because I, as should you, support both.
Last week the Salt Lake Tribune reported Utah State Representative Ken Ivory was a snake oil salesman according to a watchdog group who has filed complaints against him and his non-profit group, The American Lands Council.
The ALC is collecting tax-based donations from up to three western states on the premise that the organization can assist in getting public lands turned over to the control of the states.
He’s full of shit.
The Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance in a statement said:
“We agree with the Salt Lake Tribune. Rep. Ivory distorts the facts, dodges the truth, misconstrues history, and advances a disastrous vision that would deprive us of our public lands. He needs to answer for his organization’s compliance with lobbying rules in neighboring states.”
SUWA goes on to say that while they agree Ivory is being unethical, his actions may not be illegal. That remains to be seen.
The fine line being blurred perhaps is that Ivory, a state representative, is lobbying for his own nonprofit and drawing a salary from it to the tune of six figures. If he is not breaking the law, I am starting a nonprofit next week. You can make more money than a salvation peddling Baptist on a Sunday telling right winged fundamentalist’s that the Constitution guarantees them unending, unfettered prosperity than you can at an honest job any day of the week.
The problem with all of this is really simple, however.
I often say that there is the way it is and the way it should be, and that one would be wise to operate from the former while striving for the latter.
In the case of those wanting to transfer land “back” from the feds, however, they have dreamy ideas of how it should be that are not premised in anything that resembles fact.
The land was never theirs to begin with. The Property Clause and Supremacy Clause end that debate before it starts. In fact, those little doozie’s were in the founding documents before Utah was even a territory. Add to that things like the Federal Land Policy and Management Act of 1976 and the precedent of the failed Sagebrush Rebellion, and you have a cadre of constitutional law and subsequent precedent killing Ivory and his goons’ case at face value.
Even his own advisors—that is, the lawyers at the Office for Research and Legislative Council—have advised Utah of the unconstitutionality of the endeavor making it a case where they clearly know better but will gleefully spend millions of dollars, some of which are inadvertently school trust funds, in a frivolous lawsuit.
Like a pig with a new lipstick, Ivory follows up on the ill-gained momentum of the likes of Cliven Bundy and Phil Lyman, both of whom have either seen or will soon see that the federal government does in fact exist.
But to the more succinct point of the disparagement between state’s rights and federal oversight thereof.
I am not blind even in one eye to the current state of our governing affairs and find myself often in agreement with many of the citizens here who see the system as long past broken. The last four administrations differences can be measured in mere microns, and the erosion of our civil liberties from the top down is in overdrive. There is without question a need to take some control of our country back, and it might well begin with the abdication of the lobbying power of big corporate conglomerates.
But make no mistake of this either: it is the corporate conglomerates in the form of big energy and extractive industry that are behind Ken Ivory and his goons. If they are successful in manipulating the good people of the West into believing in the freedom powers of their snake oil, they will laugh all the way to the bank while you take a decade or less to realize you have been duped while you go from somewhat disheveled master (the fed) to a more calculated one (the corporation) who will own your land, extract every last drop, and leave you paying the bill in more ways than one.
Take heart though, because in the end, Ivory will fail at the land grab. But I wager he knows this. What he will gain is the support of the blind fools who believe in him and in some small fashion the martyrdom will secure that the reddest state in the union, stay that way.
See you out there.
Dallas Hyland is a freelance writer, award-winning photographer, and documentary filmmaker. As a senior writer, opinion editor and photo editor of The Southern Utah Independent, Hyland’s investigative journalism, opinion columns, and photo essays have ranged in topics from local political and environmental issues, to drug trafficking in Utah, as well as the international front, covering issues such as human trafficking in Colombia. On his rare off-days, he can be found with his family and friends exploring the pristine outdoors. You can listen to him live as a regular guest co-host on the Kate Dalley talk show on Fox News 1450 AM 93.1 FM in southern Utah.
