The Causby case has a very different fact pattern than a corner crossing. The US was buzzing military aircraft at 80 feet above the landowner's property, killing his livestock etc. and rendering the land totally uninhabitable. It's a different situation from stepping from one piece of public land to another piece of public land.
I agree completely. This is just the precedent case cited by attorney's I have talked to on this issue that held airspace in some capacity is owned by the landowner. I actually believe this case leaves an opening for corner crossing with this language:
"there would be an intrusion so immediate and direct as to subtract from the owner's full enjoyment of the property and to limit his exploitation of it."
This leads to the question of whether or not stepping over a tiny corner of a landowner's property subtracts from the full enjoyment of it. My contention would be no. I think a landowner making that claim is objectively unreasonable. Inversely, I believe that the landowner is interferring with the public's full enjoyment of their airspace over the public land.
I wouldn't count on this holding to be applied in a corner crossing case. The reasoning in the holding isn't particularly applicable to corner crossings.
I would bet the house that this case would be referenced in any arguments made by the landowner, should a corner crossing case go to appellate review. THEY will contend that it applies directly. However, I fully agree with you. Nobody crossing a corner is killing somebody's chickens, waking them up from sleep, or making their property "uninhabitable" as referenced in the Causby decision.
We are in agreement, ssssnake529. I think it is just the worry that this case would be applied badly to corner crossing that makes attorneys gun-shy about it. The truth is, as mentioned often in this thread, that it isn't settled. The safest bet is to not corner cross, as I mentioned before. Yet, it happens frequently in Montana, and has never been prosecuted that I have heard of. Maybe another member knows of a case, though.