56
Opinion of the Court
the application was filed, the Secretary of the Interior publicly announced the action. See U. S. Exh. 12 (Department of the Interior Press Release, Nov. 20, 1957); U. S. Exh. 32 (statement of Secretary Seaton). Formal notice of the application was published in the Federal Register in January 1958. 23 Fed. Reg. 364. Moreover, later in 1958, while Congress was considering Alaska's admission to the Union, the Secretary of the Interior informed Congress that the application for the Range was pending and submitted maps showing the area as a federal enclave embracing submerged lands. See U. S. Exh. 61 (Department of Interior, Bureau of Land Management, Alaska: Federal Land Withdrawals and Reservations, July 1958, Section No. 8).2 By virtue of that submission, Congress was on notice when it passed the Alaska Statehood Act that the Secretary of the Interior had construed his authority to withdraw or reserve lands, delegated by the President, see Exec. Order No. 10355, 3 CFR 873 (1949-1953 Comp.), to reach submerged lands. If the 1957 application in fact had the legal effect of "withdraw[ing] or otherwise set[ting] apart" lands within the proposed Range "as refuges or reservations for the protection of wildlife" within the meaning of § 6(e), then the United States retained title to submerged lands as well as uplands within the Range. This is so despite § 6(m) of the Statehood Act, which applied the Submerged Lands Act of 1953 to Alaska. The Submerged Lands Act operated to confirm Alaska's title to equal footing lands and to transfer title to submerged lands be-2 Alaska claims that the map submitted to Congress did not depict the Range, but a 1943 withdrawal under Public Land Order 82, 8 Fed. Reg. 1599, revoked, 25 Fed. Reg. 12599 (1960). Five million acres of the land to be included in the Range were covered by PLO 82, and the Secretary of the Interior announced a modification of the terms of PLO 82 and the filing of the application for the Range at the same time. See U. S. Exh. 12, p. 2; U. S. Exh. 32, p. 2. The importance of the map is not that it precisely depicts the Range's current boundaries, but that it shows the area encompassing the Range as a proposed federal enclave embracing submerged lands.
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