How Manifest Destiny continues to adversely affect the Western States

The following figures reflect the amounts in acreage and percentage of land owned by the federal government in the ten states with the most government land:

State                                         Acreage                                             Percentage

Alaska                                   171.8 million                                             47.0%

Nevada                                   56.1 million                                             79.3%

California                               44.8 million                                             44.7%

Utah                                       33.9 million                                              64.3%

Idaho                                      33.0 million                                              62.3%

Oregon                                   31.8 million                                             51.64%

Arizona                                   31.3 million                                             43.1%

Wyoming                               31.0 million                                              50.0%

New Mexico                          26.2 million                                             33.7%

Montana                                 25.5 million                                             27.3%

Washington                            12.0 million                                             28.0% 

The following figures reflect the amounts in acres and percentage of land owned by the federal government in the eleven states with the least government land:

State                                             Acreage                                             Percentage

Iowa                                         29.6 thousand                                             .08%

Delaware                                 1.9  Thousand                                             .15%

Connecticut                              6.9 thousand                                            .22%

Rhode Island                            3.1 thousand                                             .49%

New York                              196.6 Thousand                                            .64%

Kansas                                   349.7 thousand                                             .67%

Maine                                    193.2 thousand                                             .97%

Nebraska                              514.9 thousand                                            1.05%

Ohio                                      279.6 thousand                                            1.07%

Massachusetts                      52.1 thousand                                            1.04%

Texas                                        2.0 million                                                  1.2%

Is it any wonder that the Western States are so poor? Consider how much better off we would be if the government only controlled one percent of the land in these states. Severence Tax revenues? Property tax revenues? Other income syphoned off by the federal government which is unavailable to our states during the past 100 years?