UTAH v. UNITED STATES

UTAH v. UNITED STATES No. 31, Orig. Decided February 19, 1975 Decree entered February 19, 1975 — Further decree entered June 28, 1976 [MAJORITY] DECREE It is ordered, adjudged, and decreed that: 1. Taking into consideration Sections 1, 2, and 5 of the decree of this Court entered May 22, 1972, Utah v. United States, 406 U. S. 484, 485-486, Sections 1, 2, and 4 of the decree of this Court entered February 19, 1975, Utah v. United States, 420 U. S. 304, 305-306, and the further proceedings had herein pursuant to the decree of this Court entered February 19, 1975, Utah v. United States, 420 U. S. 304, and 2. Subject to any federal regulatory authority that may extend to the Great Salt Lake or its shorelands, the United States of America, its departments and agencies, are enjoined from asserting against the State of Utah any claim of right, title and interest: (a) to any lands within the meander line of the Great Salt Lake (as duly surveyed prior to or in accordance with Section 1 of the Act of June 3, 1966, 80 Stat. 192), with the exception of any lands within the Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge, the Weber Basin Federal Reclamation Project, and the Hill Air Force Range (as bounded by water’s edge June 15, 1967), the title to which last-named parcel is not decided by this decree; (b) to the natural resources and living organisms in or beneath the lands delineated in (a) above; and (c) to the natural resources and living organisms either within the waters of the Great Salt Lake, or extracted therefrom, as delineated in (a) above. 3. The State of Utah is not required to pay the United States for the lands, including the minerals, delineated in paragraph 2 above of this decree. 4. The prayer of the United States in its answer to the State of Utah’s Complaint that this Court “confirm, declare and establish that the United States is the owner of all right, title and interest in all of the lands described in Section 2 of the Act of June 3, 1966, 80 Stat. 192, as amended by the Act of August 23, 1966, 80 Stat. 349, and that the State of Utah is without any right, title or interest in such lands, save for the right to have these lands conveyed to it by the United States, and to pay for them, in accordance with the provisions of the Act of June 3,1966, as amended,” is denied. Me. Justice Marshall took no part in the consideration or decision of this decree. When “lands” appears in this decree to describe the interests involved, the word is used to include the brines and minerals in solution in the brines or precipitated or extracted therefrom.