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Montgomery Fellow Joseph Sax last night discussed the extent to which property owners control their land under new interpretations of United States property law.
Provost Lee Bollinger introduced Sax as "the foremost legal and policy theorist of the environment of our time."
Sax delivered a speech in 105 Dartmouth Hall titled, "The Owner as Steward: A Key to the Preservation of Our Heritage," to roughly 100 students, faculty and local residents.
"We are beginning a period of change in property legislation that will have profound implications for preservation of natural habitats as well as objects important to our culture," Sax said.
He said people's views about property began to change 25 years ago when questions regarding issues of environmental preservation arose.
He said people began to ask questions like, "Does the owner of land that contains the last vestiges of a species have a right to destroy this species?"
The idea of the land owner as a steward, who protects and preserves the land because it is in the public's interest, has been the greatest change in property law, Sax said.
"With a few limited exceptions -- human beings, the sea, valuable works of art, [in addition to others] -- our laws permit routine property ownership of anything that can be" tangibly held, Sax said.
Previously, he said, U.S.