Utah counties want Congress to let states manage wild horses

Iron and Beaver counties will not round up wild horses on their own, as they threatened earlier this spring, but instead are pressing for a dramatic change in how the horses are managed. They want the states, not the federal Bureau of Land Management, to decide how many horses can be on the range and what to do when there’s an overpopulation. A resolution to that effect, written by Beaver County Commissioner Mark Whitney, won the support of the Utah Association of Counties. He and a commissioner from Garfield County will next propose it to the National Association of Counties. That group meets late next week in New Orleans. Meanwhile, Rep. Chris Stewart, R-Utah, is preparing legislation that would give states and Indian tribes the option to manage wild horses, much as they do other wildlife. "This really is a political problem," said Iron County Commission Chairman David Miller. "We need Congress to get off their butts." "We know that we’ve got to use a political platform to go forward on this," said Whitney, who previously had given the BLM a "drop-dead" date of July 1 to remove excess wild horses. "The last thing we want to do is anything that would create tension or an uprising or vigilantes," Whitney said Tuesday. The BLM agrees there are more wild horses on the range than the agency wants, but it had planned no roundups this year because there is no room in its long-term pastures. Nearly 50,000 horses already are stockpiled there...more

And many states did manage them, but in 1971 Congress passed the  The Wild and Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act.  NM challenged the act as being unconstitutional and won in district court.  However, in 1976 they Supreme Court overturned the lower court and ruled that 1. The Act is a constitutional exercise of congressional power under the Property Clause of the Constitution, which provides that "Congress shall have Power to dispose of and make all needful Rules and Regulations respecting the Territory or other Property belonging to the United States."  2. The Property Clause in broad terms, empowers Congress to determine what are "needful" rules "respecting" the public lands, and there is no merit to appellees' narrow reading that the provision grants Congress power only to dispose of, to make incidental rules regarding the use of, and to protect federal property.  3. The  Property Clause must be given an expansive reading, for "[t]he power over the public lands thus entrusted to Congress is without limitations," United States v. San Francisco.  4.  Federal legislation under that Clause necessarily, under the Supremacy Clause, overrides conflicting state laws and though the Act does not establish exclusive federal jurisdiction over the public lands in New Mexico, it overrides the New Mexico Estray Law insofar as that statute attempts to regulate federally protected animals.