General Mining Law Essay ⋆ Environment Essay Examples ⋆ EssayEmpire

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The U.S. General Mining Law of 1872 was created to encourage mineral exploration and development on federal lands in the western United States, offer an opportunity to acquire clear titles to mines already being worked, and to help settle the American West. The law permitted free access to individuals and/or corporations to prospect for rocks, ores, and minerals on public lands and allowed them, after making a discovery, to stake a claim on the deposit sanctioning the development of ores and minerals from that site (originally applying to all minerals except coal).

Federal lands acquired by treaty, cession, or purchase as part of the general territory of the United States, including lands that passed out of but reverted back to federal ownership, were specifically included in the mining law administration. However, those lands acquired from a state or a private owner through gift, purchase, or condemnation are not covered by the law. Under complicated circumstances, public lands may be closed to prospecting and mineral exploration.

The General Mining Law of 1872 was the principal motivation behind the sudden growth of mineral resources in the 19th-century American West as well the associated services and industries involved in mineral production. Hard-rock minerals development included gold, silver, copper, lead, molybdenum, and uranium, with major gold and silver mining districts built under the Mining Law in California, Colorado, and Nevada. In Arizona and Colorado during the early part of the 20th century, major discoveries of porphyry copper, molybdenum, and tungsten led to extensive development and industrial growth. The law continues to support much of the West’s widespread mineral development on public domain lands and although it is not as wide-ranging, it represents a major revenue generator for the United States because most hardrock mining occurs on federal lands.

Mining Claims

Once a prospector has explored for mineral and ore deposits on public domain land, he may locate a claim believed to hold that important mineral. Claimants must then pay a yearly maintenance fee of $100 per claim to hold a claim in addition to a $25 “location fee” for first-time prospectors to record their claim. According to the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) in 2000, these fees generated $24 million representing a significant drop from $31 million in 1995 after a peak of $36 million in 1997, due primarily to a drop in gold and copper prices. Once the claim has been proven as economically recoverable, and at least $500 has been added to the development of the stake, the stakeholder may file a patent application to obtain title to all surface and mineral rights.

In 1989, a claim fee of $250 per application plus $50 per claim within each application were required. If the application is approved, the claimant may purchase all surface and mineral rights for $2.50 per acre for placer claims or $5 per acre for lode claims. Placer deposits are alluvial deposits of valuable minerals found in sand or gravel and are commonly limited to 20 acres. Hard-rock or lode claims may be larger than 20 acres. Although these fees were expensive in 1872, claimed land, minerals, and ore bodies now far surpass these amounts.

The following provisions currently apply to claims under the General Mining Law: (1) there is no limit on the number of claims one person can file, (2) there is no requirement that mineral production ever begins, (3) mineral production can take place with or without a patent or any payments to the federal government, (4) claims can be held indefinitely with or without production; however, they are subject to contest if not developed.

In 2000, most of the current U.S. mining activity and mineral claims under the General Mining Law were located in only five states. Of a total of 235,948 mining claims, 45 percent were in Nevada alone and 35 percent are in Arizona, California, Montana, and Wyoming.

The freedom with which claims may be staked, the relatively low fees associated with claims, and the lack of demands in the Law for remediation of mined sites, have led to a barrage of criticisms over the last century, with movements to amend or appeal the Law on many occasions. Specifically, critics suggest that the low fees do not account for externalized environmental costs associated with mining and represent a subsidy for development of otherwise pristine lands to large mining corporations, many of which are owned and operated from outside the United States. Congressional review of the Law during the late 1990s led to a number of suggestions for revisions, but environmentalist calls for its total repeal have gone unheeded.

Bibliography:

Saleem Ali, Mining, the Environment, and Indigenous Development Conflicts (University of Arizona Press, 2003);
Sandor Demlinger, Mining in the Old West (Schiffer Publishing, 2006);
David Stiller, Wounding the West: Montana, Mining and the Environment (University of Nebraska Press, 2000).