In all modern states, some land is held by central or local governments. This is called public land. The system of tenure of public land, and the terminology used, varies between countries. The following examples illustrate some of the range.
Australia and New Zealand
In several Commonwealth countries, public lands are referred to as Crown lands. Recent proposals to sell Crown lands have been highly controversial.
In the United States, public land is any lands or rights interest to which the title is held by the federal government, also called the public domain. The majority of public lands are managed by the Bureau of Land Management under the Secretary of Interior. National Parks and Monuments are also public lands, but they are managed by the National Park Service, which is also part of the Interior Department. Individual states may also own land within that state, which is also often considered as public land, but this is of a different category than land held by the federal government.
Publicland is also called land in the public domain.
Additional publicland was acquired with the Louisiana Purchase (1803), Florida (1819), Oregon (1846), the Mexican Cession (1848), the Gadsden Purchase (1853), and Alaska (1867).
Almost as soon as publicland was acquired the federal government began to dispose of it through grants to states, railroad companies, settlers (see Homestead Act, 1862), colleges (see land-grant colleges and universities), and cash sales.
PublicLands, in United States law, term designating largely vacant and unappropriated lands administered by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) of the United States Department of the Interior.
Land warrants were purchased for a mere fraction of their face value by speculators.
Grants of publiclands were awarded by Congress to encourage the construction of canals, wagon roads, and railroads, and to reclaim swamplands.
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