2011 US Code
Title 16 - Conservation
Chapter 1 - NATIONAL PARKS, MILITARY PARKS, MONUMENTS, AND SEASHORES (§§ 1 - 460zzz-7)
Subchapter V - YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK (§§ 21 - 40c)
Section 24 - Jurisdiction over park; fugitives from justice

The Yellowstone National Park, as its boundaries now are defined, or as they may be hereafter defined or extended, shall be under the sole and exclusive jurisdiction of the United States. All the laws applicable to places under the sole and exclusive jurisdiction of the United States, shall have force and effect in said park. Nothing in this Act shall be construed to forbid the service in the park of any civil or criminal process of any court having jurisdiction in the States of Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming. All fugitives from justice taking refuge in said park shall be subject to the same laws as refugees from justice found in the State of Wyoming.

(May 7, 1894, ch. 72, §1, 28 Stat. 73.)

This Act, referred to in text, is act May 7, 1894, which is classified to sections 24 to 30a of this title. For complete classification of this Act to the Code, see Tables.

Section 2 of act May 7, 1894, provided that the Yellowstone National Park should be part of the judicial district of Wyoming, and that the courts of the United States for the district should have jurisdiction of all offenses committed within the park. It was superseded by act Mar. 3, 1911, ch. 231, §115, 36 Stat. 1130, constituting the State of Wyoming and Yellowstone National Park the judicial district of Wyoming, that section being in turn superseded by act June 5, 1924, ch. 260, 43 Stat. 388. Provisions of that act are covered by section 131 of Title 28, Judiciary and Judicial Procedure.

The act admitting the State of Wyoming into the Union, act July 10, 1890, ch. 664, 26 Stat. 222, contained a proviso annexed to the description of the boundaries of the State, in section 2 of the act, as follows: “That nothing in this act contained shall repeal or affect any act of Congress relating to the Yellowstone National Park, or the reservation of the Park as now defined, or as may be hereafter defined or extended, or the power of the United States over it; and nothing contained in this act shall interfere with the right and ownership of the United States in said park and reservation as it now is or may hereafter be defined or extended by law; but exclusive legislation, in all cases whatsoever, shall be exercised by the United States, which shall have exclusive control and jurisdiction over the same; but nothing in this proviso contained shall be construed to prevent the service within said park of civil and criminal process lawfully issued by the authority of said State.”