Allegheny Almanac

de facto Eminent Domain in the Allegheny National Forest

by Chris Lareau

editor, Allegheny Almanac

As things currently stand in the multitude and years of litigations over the Allegheny National Forest, a half-million acres of woods in northwestern Pennsylvania, property owners are being denied their rights. Specifically, the right to drill for oil.

In the early 1960s when John Kennedy was President, other property owners, the Seneca Nation and residents of Kinzua, were denied the right of ownership in nearly the same location, and it too was litigated up to but not including the U.S. Supreme Court. The effective federal court decision removed the last vestiges of indian sovereignty in the state of Pennsylvania. The story of this loss of property lives on in song and literature. Resolution of today's important mattter of mineral rights on federal property here may stimulate similar interest. The only difference this time is that the litigation may go all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Read a summary of the federal court case at the Erie Times-News

Visit the Allegheny National Forest

For more info google "Friends of Allegheny Wilderness"