## Facts

- The Taylor Grazing Act authorizes the Secretary of the Interior to create grazing districts, set grazing amounts, and issue grazing permits, while providing that permits create no “right, title, interest, or estate” in federal lands.
- The Act grants a statutory “preference” in permitting to specified categories (including landowners engaged in the livestock business), but conditions safeguarding of grazing privileges on consistency with the Act’s purposes and provisions.
- In 1995, the Department of the Interior amended grazing regulations governing federal rangelands.
- One rule redefined “grazing preference” to mean a priority in allocation rather than a fixed number of animal unit months (AUMs), and treated the quantity of forage authorized as “permitted use” determined through land-use planning.
- A second rule broadened permit eligibility by allowing “stock owners” who were not necessarily “engaged in the livestock business” to qualify for permits.
- A third rule provided that the United States would hold title to future “permanent” range improvements constructed under cooperative range-improvement agreements.
- Ranching organizations challenged these regulations as exceeding statutory authority and as impairing protected grazing privileges.
- The district court invalidated four regulations; the court of appeals reinstated three of them; the Supreme Court reviewed those three regulations.

## Issues

1. Whether redefining “grazing preference” as priority (and shifting quantified use to “permitted use” tied to land-use plans) violates the Act’s requirement that grazing privileges be “adequately safeguarded.”
2. Whether allowing permit eligibility for “stock owners” not “engaged in the livestock business” exceeds the Secretary’s authority given the Act’s preference categories.
3. Whether vesting title to future permanent range improvements in the United States violates the Taylor Grazing Act or unlawfully impairs permittees’ interests.

## Decision

- The Supreme Court unanimously affirmed the judgment upholding all three regulations.
- The Court held that the Taylor Grazing Act does not freeze AUM quantities as part of a protected “preference,” and the Secretary may reasonably define preference as priority while allocating “permitted use” through land-use planning.
- The Court held that the Act’s use of “stock owners” for eligibility and “engaged in the livestock business” for preference supports allowing non-ranching stock owners to hold permits, while still honoring the statutory preference scheme.
- The Court held that granting the United States title to future permanent range improvements is within the Secretary’s authority and is consistent with the statute’s denial of property rights in federal grazing permits.

## Legal Principles

- When a statute conditions protection of regulated interests on consistency with statutory purposes and also denies that permits create any property interest in federal lands, agencies retain substantial discretion to adjust permit terms and related definitions within statutory bounds.
- “Preference” provisions can be reasonably construed as establishing relative priority rather than guaranteeing a fixed quantity of use, especially where the statute contemplates conservation and agency management of rangelands.
- Statutory eligibility language (“stock owners”) may be broader than statutory preference categories; an agency may allow eligibility beyond the preferred subset while continuing to apply preference in allocation decisions.
- Absent a statutory command vesting ownership in permittees, an agency may assign the United States title to permanent improvements attached to federal land under cooperative agreements, consistent with federal land management authority.

## Conclusion

The Court upheld the 1995 grazing regulations as permissible constructions of the Taylor Grazing Act, emphasizing that federal grazing permits are nonproperty privileges and that the Secretary may restructure preference, broaden eligibility within statutory text, and assign title to future permanent improvements while managing rangelands through land-use planning.


Public Lands Council v. Babbitt, 529 U.S. 728 (2000)