Joseph Feller

Professor Joseph Feller recently was quoted in an Associated Press article titled, “Lawmakers pick fight with feds over public lands.”

The March 7 article reported on Arizona and Utah lawmakers who are attempting to force the federal government to hand over control of public territory that makes up much of the West, insisting local leaders could manage it better.

Feller argued that the challenges will not get far because any attempt by state legislatures to claim federal land is unconstitutional.

“That’s not really open to dispute,” Feller said. “The states have absolutely no power to take over the federal public land. They’ve tried it before.”

The article also appeared on CBS News and Salon.com, and in The Dallas Morning News.

Read it here.

Feller teaches Water Law, Natural Resources Law and Property. Since joining the College in 1987, he also has taught Civil Procedure, Western River Management: Law & Science, Western Forest and Range Management: Law & Science, and the Civil Practice Clinic. Each spring, he leads law students on a field seminar to national forests, national parks and monuments, and other public lands in Northern Arizona to expose them to some of the people, places and issues involved in the implementation of natural resource laws. He was on leave from 2008-2011, serving as senior counsel to the National Wildlife Federation in its Rocky Mountain Natural Resource Center in Boulder, Colo., and teaching at the University of Colorado Law School.