Helena debate reignites over corner crossing and public land access

A debate over who can step across a survey corner to reach public land landed back in Helena as lawmakers weighed a question that affects hunters, anglers and recreationists across Lewis and Clark County and far beyond: is corner crossing trespass, or a lawful route to land the public already owns?

The Montana Environmental Quality Council took up the issue during its May 12-13 meeting in Helena, where Lt. Gov. Kristen Juras defended the view that property rights and trespass rules are primarily for states to define. Juras, a former University of Montana School of Law property-law professor, leaned on familiar common-law ideas, including the ad coelum doctrine and the principle that landownership includes the right to exclude others. She also acknowledged that modern law has limited that doctrine in some areas, including airspace and mineral rights.

The practical stakes in Montana are enormous. Data from onX shows about 1.5 million acres of public land in the state are locked behind private property, including roughly 871,000 acres that are corner-locked, where access depends on moving across the point where two public parcels meet. onX says controversial corners restrict access to 8.3 million acres across 11 western states, and its access materials say more than 15 million acres of federal and state land in the West are landlocked or corner-locked. onX also says Wyoming leads the nation with 2.4 million acres of corner-locked public land.

The legal backdrop hardened over the past year. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit issued its ruling in Iron Bar Holdings, LLC v. Cape on March 18, 2025, and the U.S. Supreme Court later declined to review the case on October 20, 2025. Montana is in the Ninth Circuit, so the Wyoming ruling does not directly control Montana law, but it intensified pressure on state officials to clarify what counts as lawful access here. Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks reaffirmed on November 3, 2025 that corner crossing remains unlawful in Montana and that hunters should continue to seek permission from adjoining landowners. The agency also said wardens have been told to use discretion when deciding whether to issue trespass citations.

That position drew criticism from Mike Volesky, a former FWP chief of operations, who said the administration was trying to create new law without legislative authority. The issue has also split ranching and public-access interests: in August 2025, the Montana Stockgrowers Association joined Wyoming ranch groups in asking the Supreme Court to take up the issue nationwide, while groups such as Earthjustice and the Sierra Club treated the Tenth Circuit case as a major win for access. For Helena, and for counties like Lewis and Clark that sit at the intersection of public lands and private holdings, the fight now is not just over one Wyoming case, but over who gets to reach the land Montanans already believe belongs to them.