You might be interested in this analysis by the Heritage Foundation: http://www.heritage.org/constitution/...

One can also argue that because the Constitution does not specifically grant the ownership of Federal Land within a State (especially without its permission), that the Tenth Amendment forbids it, but this is an argument of derivation rather than conclusion.

Here's more of an opinion piece that hearkens back to the Sagebrush Rebellion, predating by decades this altercation but instigated by the same overreach of government: http://www.nationalreview.com/article...

There is no valid analogy between the Federal lands problem and squatting in someone else's apartment. That confusion is being deliberately spread by leftist propaganda to spin their Federal control agenda with dishonest appeals to respect for private property. Don't be fooled by it. They do this in different kinds of controversies because they don't dare explicitly promote their anti-private property ideology and because they know that most people still respect private property but don't understand it conceptually well enough to see through the distortions. The package dealing and distortions in equating government actions, and the anti-concept of "public ownership", with private property rights has been so prevalent that it would not be surprising if it were focus-group tested as a deliberate political tactic.

The Federal government has jurisdiction over the land, not property rights. Government bureaucrats do not use Federal power to do anything by "right", nor does the Constitution authorize permanent Federal 'ownership' for everything from ranch lands to parks and wilderness as we have today. Government officials claimed to be acting by "'right" in their official capacity using their monopoly on the use of force is tyranny. Doing it for land socialism is the particular form.

For about the first century the Federal government oversaw the recognition of claims by settlers and industry to private property rights on unowned land in the western Territories. The early progressive movement reversed that policy under the influence of European ideology in the last part of the 19th century. It was carried out in part by by Eastern financial interests exploiting their growing influence over government to gain an advantage over use of the western lands. That is how the Federal government came to be registered for 'ownership' on deeds, regarded as permanent, as if it were no different than registering private property ownership..

The result over time was the vast permanent "Federal lands" and the patchwork of private and government land, mostly in the west where most of the unowned land was.The private land parcels that had been settled and claimed were typically too small to support ranching in particular, resulting in private ranches also using government land under permits, with the Federal land agencies assuming and retaining the power of permanent control of land not privately owned. The ranchers have been made dependent on Federal land because property ownership has been outlawed, not because they were trying to get something for free. That is the history of the Bundy land in particular.

At first, the progressives controlled industrial use, such as logging, on Federal lands in a land-socialist manner, than began expanding non-use preservationist policies in the early 20th century. (The National Park Service was created in 1916.) By the 1970s a major campaign by the viro pressure group lobby and activists entrenched inside the agencies, seeking to eradicate the American cowboy and lock up the Federal lands for wilderness, was well underway. They exploited the permit fee system to try to drive out the ranchers, in particular, by ruining them financially in addition to progressively restrictive regulations.

Despite that history there are still legally recognized private property interests in some of the Federal lands -- including water rights. See Wayne Hage's Storm Over Rangelands: Private Rights in Federal Lands, 2nd ed 1990 for the legal history.

The Bundy's self-help legal strategy was poorly conceived and executed, causing setbacks in precedent in addition to their failure to secure their legally valid rights even under the current system. But their frustration is valid, and aside from the propensity to think of themselves as revolutionaries taking up arms in self defense, their policy objections and frustrations are widely shared, though blocked out of most of the reporting.

In particular, the Hammonds, who were viciously persecuted by the government, rejected the Bundy tactics and so did most of their neighbors. But all of it is a very real reaction to very real and worsening government clamping down for wilderness preservationism and extermination of industry and private rights. None of it is a "cheap publicity stunt", and which protestors are from "out of state" is irrelevant. This problem is across the west where most of the Federal lands are, and has spread to everywhere else, too, in a different form where the viros and bureaucrats are after private property as well. The common interests against the viro movement were the basis of the nation-wide "Wise Use Movement" that grew in the 1980s, expanding on the Sage Brush Rebellion in the west. None of us are "squatters" on the "people's land".

The Bundy controversy has been discussed and documented on this forum previously, for example:

"An indictment that came back pretty fast" https://www.galtsgulchonline.com/post...

"Breaking: More information on Lavoy Finicum shooting shows Feds initiated" https://www.galtsgulchonline.com/post...

"FBI agent indicted for false statements about LaVoy Finicum shooting" https://www.galtsgulchonline.com/post...

So all I see in your arguments is a bunch of "I didn't like it so I'll call it what I want." That's up to you. I researched the history of both areas and according to what I can find, the federal government caused the problems - not the ranchers. And I don't see you denying that point - which is the critical one.

And apologies for my math - Ammon has been jailed since the Malheur standoff - and yes, he is being tortured. I'll encourage you to do the research so my sources don't offend you.

And PS - I live not too far away as well and I, too, have talked to primary sources. I am not arguing that the Hammonds requested the Bundy's assistance. What they (the Bundy's) did was highlight the abuses by the federal government of those lands because their own story was similar. That's all they were trying to do until the FBI came in. The FBI even admitted that until later on, they had a cordial relationship with those at the refuge. The entire reason they wanted to hold town meetings was to bring up the problems of malfeasance on the part of the BLM which had been going on for decades both in Oregon AND Nevada. And it was when they were travelling to one of these meetings that Finicum was murdered.

Mrs. Hammond herself had obtained documents during the original trial which demonstrated that the Malheur officials had intentionally flooded out dozens of other ranchers and that their actions had done more damage to the refuge than good. Unfortunately, the trial was rigged by the judge officiating over it - see the link I posted below. Those are the facts. But assaulting the veracity of the sources goes both ways. In the end, its a pointless tactic that makes you look just as partisan as you claim I am being.