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PUBLIC LANDS COUNCIL v. BABBITT

Opinion of the Court

knowledged shall be adequately safeguarded, but the
creation of a grazing district or the issuance of a
permit . . . shall not create any right, title, interest, or
estate in or to the lands.”

Ibid.

C

The Taylor Act delegated to the Interior Department an
enormous administrative task. To administer the Act, the
Department needed to determine the bounds of the public
range, create grazing districts, determine their grazing ca-
pacity, and divide that capacity among applicants.
It soon
set bounds encompassing more than 140 million acres, and
by 1936 the Department had created 37 grazing districts, see
Department of Interior Ann. Rep. 15 (1935); W. Calef, Pri-
vate Grazing and Public Lands 58–59 (1960). The Secretary
then created district advisory boards made up of
local
ranchers and called on them for further help. See 2 App.
809–811 (Rules for Administration of Grazing Districts (Mar.
2, 1936)). Limited department resources and the enormity
of the administrative task made the boards “the effective
governing and administrative body of each grazing district.”
Calef, supra, at 60; accord, P. Foss, Politics and Grass 199–
200 (1960).

By 1937 the Department had set the basic rules for allo-
cation of grazing privileges. Those rules recognized that
many ranchers had long maintained herds on their own pri-
vate lands during part of the year, while allowing their herds
to graze farther aﬁeld on public land at other times. The
rules consequently gave a ﬁrst preference to owners of stock
who also owned “base property,” i. e., private land (or water
rights) sufﬁcient to support their herds, and who had grazed
the public range during the ﬁve years just prior to the Taylor
Act’s enactment. See 2 App. 818–819 (Rules for Adminis-
tration of Grazing Districts (June 14, 1937)). They gave a
second preference to other owners of nearby “base” property