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Title 30 — Mineral Lands and Mining

Chapter 2 — Mineral Lands and Regulations in General

§ 22. Lands open to purchase by citizens

Statutory text

Except as otherwise provided, all valuable mineral deposits in lands belonging to the United States, both surveyed and unsurveyed, shall be free and open to exploration and purchase, and the lands in which they are found to occupation and purchase, by citizens of the United States and those who have declared their intention to become such, under regulations prescribed by law, and according to the local customs or rules of miners in the several mining districts, so far as the same are applicable and not inconsistent with the laws of the United States.

Legislative history

Reconstructed from this section’s Code source credit and amendment notes, resolved against the local Statutes at Large. Editorial notes are evidence, not the law that made the change.

  1. (R.S. § 2319.)

    Enacted · 30 U.S.C. § 22

    (R.S. § 2319.)

    Unresolved: No Public Law or Statutes at Large citation in the Code source.

    Source evidence

    Code source credit
    (R.S. § 2319.)

0 of 1 references resolved to an enrolled provision · 1 unresolved

Editorial Notes

Codification

R.S. § 2319 derived from act May 10, 1872, ch. 152, § 1, 17 Stat. 91.

Words “Except as otherwise provided,” were editorially supplied on authority of act Feb. 25, 1920, ch. 85, 41 Stat. 437, popularly known as the Mineral Lands Leasing Act, which is classified to chapter 3A (§ 181 et seq.) of this title.

Statutory Notes and Related Subsidiaries

Short Title

Sections 22 to 24, 26 to 28, 29, 30, 33 to 35, 37, 39 to 43, and 47 of this title are based on sections of the Revised Statutes which are derived from act May 10, 1872, ch. 152, 17 Stat. 91, popularly known as the “General Mining Act of 1872” and as the “Mining Law of 1872”.

Credits

(R.S. § 2319.)

Parsed from the official OLRC USLM XML in data/usc_all/usc30.xml · release point 119-108 · OLRC build 2026-04-17

USLM identifier /us/usc/t30/s22