[jandrewrogers]

Changing the law ignores the problem. This involves vast amounts of titled property with centuries of history. People respond very poorly to wholesale deprivation of property rights such that the political ramifications cannot be ignored, and the US Constitution puts strict limits on the nature of such deprivations.

This is essentially in the same class of situation as the government deciding to nationalize everyone's private home to solve some Important Problem. There isn't a realistic version of the world where that is a politically viable solution and the costs would be intractably high.