Mr. YATES. The public domain, Senator, would be absolutely useless except to cattle outfits and sheep outfits already in existence, for the simple reason that the water is all taken up by these outfits, and without water the public domain would be absolutely useless from a livestock grazing standpoint.

The CHAIRMAN. If the use of the public domain should be denied entirely, what effect would it have upon the value of these properties that are now being used in conjunction with the public domain? Mr. YATES. They would be absolutely worthless.

The CHAIRMAN. And their powers to contribute to the conduct of local government and public improvement would be destroyed? Mr. YATES. It would.

The CHAIRMAN. How do you regard the livestock industry as to its rating among your other industries within the State?

Mr. YATES. I think it is the most important industry we have in the State, the most permanent important industry.

The CHAIRMAN. Are you more dependent upon that industry for a source of revenue for the purpose of carrying on your local and State government and public improvements than any other

industry?

Mr. YATES. We are.

The CHAIRMAN. If Congress should enact such a law, would it be necessary, in your opinion, for it to be administered in a way similar to the handling of the railroad lands to which you have referred? That is, that it be used in common?

Mr. YATES. I think that is the only way it could be handled in this part of the country, Senator. I do not believe that any given territory can be allotted to any particular outfit, especially in the late fall, winter and spring months, for the reason that sometimes we have 2 feet of snow on the winter range, and if there is that much snow over here we must go over there, and if there is 9 feet here we must go this way. Our own outfit covers about 100 miles of territory between our winter and summer ranges, and some outfits, as I have stated, travel anywhere from 150 to 250 miles. The CHAIRMAN. Then it is your opinion that the leases would necessarily be community leases?

Mr. YATES. They would have to be to be at all workable.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Yates, do you believe that Congress should enact a law legalizing the right to graze within the national forest? Mr. YATES. Yes, I do. I think that if the rules and regulations were in the form of laws we would know a little more where we

are at.

The CHAIRMAN. Do you believe that such a law should provide for the establishment of a commission, a trial agency, or tribunal of disinterested people to decide irreconcilable controversies that may

arise between officials of the Forest Service and the users of the range?

Mr. YATES. Yes, I do. And I think they should have a little more authority than that. I believe they should assist in drawing up rules and regulations. That is, there should be a little cooperation upon the part of the users of the forest reserve when the rules and regulations are drawn up, and not have them drawn up solely by the Forest Service.

The CHAIRMAN. Do you believe that the right to graze within the national forest should become a contractual right as between the Government and the users of the forest reserve and that the rules and regulations providing for the grazing of the area should be made a part of the contract as between the Government and the lessee or permittee?

Mr. YATES. Yes; I do not see any objection to that.

The CHAIRMAN. Well, do you believe that would be helpful?

Mr. YATES. If every man when he entered into a contract with the Government would know exactly what was expected of him, I think it would be helpful.

Mr. BOWDEN. Is it true that most of the ranches located in this part of Wyoming were developed by the owners because of the fact that they had access to the public domain?

Mr. YATES. There is absolutely no question about that, Mr. Bowden.

Mr. BOWDEN. In your judgment, do you think the use of the public domain should be recognized as a right?

Mr. YATES. Yes; certainly.

Mr. BOWDEN. To recognize that as a right would require the enactment of legislation. Would you favor the enactment of legislation providing a means of establishing range rights?

Mr. YATES. Oh, I should say the present system that we are working under now is just as good as passing any laws or making any rules and regulations covering the situation.

Mr. BOWDEN. Now, in the development of reclamation projects, there is an appropriation of water, and that goes on for a period of years, and there is a question of how much water the various persons should use, and you finally end in an adjudication of the water rights. Can you conceive where your range situation might, in the course of time, develop into a situation where you would have to adjudicate range rights?

Mr. YATES. No; I don't believe any adjudication is necessary. The control of the water practically adjudicates the control of the public range.

Mr. BOWDEN. That might not be true on some ranges. For instance, on the desert, where there is no water, there is no control over that range at all, and there is nothing to prevent outsiders from coming in and using that as winter range, is there?

Mr. YATES. No; nothing at all.

Mr. BOWDEN. And over vast sections of this country that situation exists. What would you do in a situation like that? Should the owners of the dependent ranch property in that neighborhood be protected?

Mr. YATES. Do you mean solely on the winter range?

Mr. BOWDEN. Yes.

Mr. YATES. I don't know, I am sure, how you would protect them. Our winter range around Rock Springs is used by outfits as far west as 100 or 150 miles. They come in here from their home ranges and use our winter range. On account of the scarcity of snow in their own immediate vicinity, they must come down to the railroad or to the line, as we call it, to winter their sheep. So it is not really controlled at the present time except through the ownership of these railroad lands. That is, of course, controlled to a certain extent, but

outside of lands owned here by the grazing association we have no control.

Mr. BOWDEN. In certain parts of the country where control is necessary in order to protect ranch properties, a number of stockmen have advocated that control of the public domain be made optional with the various localities. Have you any comment to make upon the proposal to incorporate into the law a local-option provision?

Mr. YATES. Yes; if a lease law is passed, I certainly think it should contain some provision to give the stockman what we might call a local option to decide whether or not they desire to come within the provisions of the law.

Mr. BOWDEN. Do you believe they should have the right to decide if they want to continue under the existing conditions?

Mr. YATES. Yes.

Mr. BOWDEN. Do you believe that ultimately the public domain should pass into private hands; that it should be owned by ranch men ultimately?

Mr. YATES. NO; I do not. I do not see how it possibly can be. If a sheep outfit owned the range it uses during the grazing year, they could not pay taxes on it; they would have to go out of business. Mr. BOWDEN. Then do you think it economical to continue the polier of homesteading the public domain?

Mr. YATES. In this part of the country we have been troubled very little with homesteaders, because the land is of such a nature that it is absolutely impossible to make a living on it under any of the homestead laws. The 640-acre homestead law, to my mind, is more or less of a farce. The law provides that only a certain kind of land can be entered under it, presumably land that crops can be raised upon. There must be water there, and if a man has not water enough to raise his crops on it. I certainly do not see there is any use living on it and trying to homestead it and patent it.

Mr. BOWDEN. In your judgment, there is no land left in this part of Wyoming which can be taken up under the 640-acre homestead

law!

Mr. YATES. Absolutely none.

Mr. BOWDEN. Do you favor the passing of a law that would provide for the taking up of this land under any homestead policy?"

Mr. YATES. I do not see that there would be any object in passing a law, Mr. Bowden, if a man could not make a living on it. It would not matter whether it was 640 acres or 2,000 acres.

Mr. BOWDEN. Would you favor the passage of a law providing for the sale of this land?

Mr. YATES. NO; I would not.

Mr. BOWDEN. In other words, you prefer

Mr. YATES. The existing conditions.

Mr. BOWDEN. You would have the land remain as it is, in the hands

of the Federal Government, without any control?

Mr. YATES. I do not see any other way out of it, as far as local conditions here are concerned.

Mr. BOWDEN. Are you a permittee on the forest reserve?

Mr. YATES. Yes, sir.

Mr. BOWDEN. On what forest?

Mr. YATES. The Bridger National Forest.

Mr. BOWDEN. Would you be in favor of the adoption of a law providing for the leasing of the forest reserve on an area basis for a period of years to the present permittees?

Mr. YATES. I think I would.

Mr. BOWDEN. Would you be in favor of stabilizing the present preferences? By that I mean if a man had a permit to graze 5,000 sheep at the present time, that permit should be recognized for a period of years, and if he had a permit for 12,000 head of sheep, it should be recognized, irrespective of the number.

Mr. YATES. Yes, surely.

Mr. BOWDEN. That is, you would favor a law stabilizing the preference system on the national forest?

Mr. YATES. Yes: certainly.

Mr. BOWDEN. Irrespective of numbers?

Mr. YATES. Yes.

Mr. BOWDEN. Then you are not in favor of the Forest Service policy of cutting down the large users for the benefit of newcomers or small users?

Mr. YATES. NO; I am not; I am absolutely opposed to it.

Mr. BOWDEN. Will you state your reasons?

Mr. YATES. Yes; I will. I will take our own outfit as an instance. We have been cut down once. We formerly had a permit-that is, the two outfits that I am interested in, the Midland Livestock Co. and the Dunton Sheep Co. We formerly had permits totaling 6,000 head. Now we have 5,200. We probably have about $60,000 invested in ranches, stock in our grazing association, and equipment for operating our sheep outfit. We probably have about the same amount of capital tied up in sheep. If we can not run a certain number of sheep-and we can not run them unless we are allowed a sufficient number on the forest reserve each year-we might as well go out of business. If they keep cutting us down and cutting us down our overhead is too much. You have to keep up your ranges, you have to pay taxes, and if you are doing that and can not run sheep, then eventually you are going to go out of business, because you must have a certain number of sheep to take care of a certain overhead. I do not think it is right for a man to come in and take up 160 acres of land somewhere and crowd some outfit of operators that has been using it for 15 or 20 years possibly and has all its money tied up in ranches and equipment.

Mr. BOWDEN. Then you are opposed to the Forest Service policy of equalizing the users of the forest reserves?

Mr. YATES. Do you mean all present users, Mr. Bowden?

Mr. BOWDEN. Yes.

Mr. YATES. I did not quite understand your question. Do you mean they should all have a certain number?

Mr. BOWDEN. Yes; that you should be protected only to a certain number.

Mr. YATES. Well, I think an outfit should be protected according to the number of sheep it owns and according to the permit it has had during the past years..

Mr. BOWDEN. And you think that the classification of permittees according to size of permit should be done away with so far as preference is concerned?

Mr. YATES. Yes; I think other things ought to be taken into consideration.

The CHAIRMAN. That is all, unless you have a further statement to make.

Mr. YATES. No.

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. Mr. Taliaferro.

STATEMENT OF T. S. TALIAFERRO, JR., CATTLE AND SHEEP RAISER, ROCK SPRINGS, WYO.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Taliaferro, are you engaged in the livestock business?

Mr. TALIAFERRO. I am; cattle and sheep, both.

The CHAIRMAN. How long have you been engaged in the livestock business?

Mr. TALIAFERRO. Probably 25 years.

The CHAIRMAN. Where are your operations located?

Mr. TALIAFERRO. In Sweetwater and Lincoln Counties, Wyo., using the Teton and Wyoming National Forests.

The CHAIRMAN. Have you been using that range for the 25 years? Mr. TALIAFERRO. Yes, sir; I have been using the range in Sweetwater County for 25 years.

The CHAIRMAN. Have you a statement that you will make to this committee, Mr. Taliaferro?

Mr. TALIAFERRO. I have no written statement, but there is one thing I would like to call the attention of the committee to, because I have not heard it mentioned here to-day, and it touches, I think, a very vital matter as giving to my mind the last expression of the livestock men in all of the public-land States.

You will recollect, Senator, that during the last two years of the administration of President Roosevelt he summoned those that were interested in the public domain in all the public lands States, which included all of the States west of the Missouri River and some States, I think, that were east of the Missouri, to assemble at Denver, Colo., at which time and place Mr. Pinchot, at that time the Chief Forester, was to meet with these representatives and to discuss the matter of the public domain.

That convention met with a delegation of, I think, representative stockmen from every State west of the Missouri River, and discussed for several days the question of the public domain. The resolution of that convention, which was the only one that has ever been assembled. I think, in America, that had the right to speak for the stockmen, was almost unanimously, but not quite, against any proposition for leasing the public domain.

That was their last formal expression. Whatever expression the American National Livestock Association may have made is ex parte, and any expression we may make here to-day or consider is to a certain extent ex parte.

The Denver convention-and I see a good many gentlemen here to-day that attended that convention-was primarily called at the request of the President of the United States. The delegates were elected to that congress, Their credentials were submitted to officials appointed under the authority of the President. They represented the livestock interests as well as banking and all other interests.