At the time the Wright brothers invented the airplane, American
law held that a property owner presumptively owned not just the sur-face
of his land, but all the land below, down to the center of the earth,
and all the space above, to “an indefinite extent, upwards.”1 For many
years, scholars had puzzled about how best to interpret the idea that
rights in land ran to the heavens. Did that mean that you owned the
stars? Could you prosecute geese for their willful and regular trespass?
Then came airplanes, and for the first time, this principle of Amer-ican
law—deep within the foundations of our tradition, and acknowl-edged
by the most important legal thinkers of our past—mattered. If
my land reaches to the heavens, what happens when United flies over
my field? Do I have the right to banish it from my property? Am I allowed
to enter into an exclusive license with Delta Airlines? Could we
set up an auction to decide how much these rights are worth? (da introdução)