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Mining Claims On Public Lands: A Study Of Interior Department Procedures, Peter L. Strauss

Faculty Scholarship

The Department of the Interior's disposition of mining claims on public lands, largely unknown to lawyers outside the West, is a significant field of federal administrative activity and an important element in planning rational use of the public lands. While energy minerals found under public lands typically pass by lease and common varieties such as sand and gravel are subject to sale, most other mineral deposits on federal property are claimed for possible exploitation by the mining claim, or "location."

The location system arose out of miners' custom, at a time when the federal lands were vacant and no federal …