Records of the Land Rights Council

Based in San Luis, Colorado, the Land Rights Council was formed in 1978 as a grassroots advocacy organization to protect the community's rights originally received under the Mexican land grant system. The Council has been committed not only to regaining historic rights to La Sierra through a series of court cases, but also to maintaining its ecological health. This mountain tract east of town is the source of three rivers and many tributary streams, used for the area's acequia-based agriculture. The group has been part of both the Chicano rights movement in Colorado and one of the longest running court cases in the country.

The Land Rights Council, run by a volunteer board of directors, was founded by Apolinar Rael, Ray Otero, and Shirley Romero with a grant from the Catholic Church's Campaign for Human Development. Their main initial activity involved conducting research and gathering documentation related to the land grant and descendants of the original settlers. This laid the groundwork for a class action lawsuit filed in 1981 on behalf of more than 100 successors. Rael v. Taylor made its way to the Colorado Supreme Court where it was reversed and remanded to the trial court in 1994. The primary attorney representing the plaintiffs pro bono from 1978 until 2002 was Jeffrey Goldstein.

The land in question, in what is now Costilla County at the southern end of Colorado's San Luis Valley, used to be Mexican territory. In 1843 it was established as the Sangre de Cristo Land Grant. Mexican land grant laws recognized the land and its natural resources as communal in use, and its later owner, Carlos Beaubien, guaranteed in writing the inhabitants' rights to pastures, water, firewood, and timber. In 1960 North Carolina lumberman John T. (Jack) Taylor purchased more than 77,000 acres of the grant, including the 14,069-foot mountain Culebra Peak, with the intention of logging it. He established the private Taylor Ranch immediately east of the town of San Luis.

Over the decades, the Land Rights Council has worked to defend the rights of the descendants of the Sangre de Cristo Land Grant by organizing the community, publishing educational materials, establishing a communication network, and holding conferences and workshops. Their actions have also been essential to the protection of the ecological health of the water, grazing land, and timber.

In 1998, the Lobato v. Taylor trial retried the Rael case in the Costilla County District Court. It ascended to the Colorado Supreme Court, which rendered a decision in favor of the plaintiffs in 2002, issued in 2016. Taylor passed away in 1988 and the land, now known as Cielo Vista Ranch, changed hands several times, with the current owner having chosen to appeal the case no further, as of fall 2018. The Land Rights Council continues to work on expanding rights and ensuring equitable environmental governance.