NATIONAL FORESTS AND THE PUBLIC DOMAIN SATURDAY, OCTOBER 10, 1925 UNITED STATES SENATE, Albuquerque, N. Mex. The subcommittee met at 9:30 o'clock a. m. on Saturday, October 10, 1925, at the Franciscan Hotel, Albuquerque, N. Mex., pursuant to adjournment on yesterday, Senator Ralph Cameron presiding. There were also present and sitting with the committee Senator Sam G. Bratton of New Mexico and Representative John Morrow, Representative at Large from New Mexico. Senator CAMERON (presiding). The committee will come to order. I first want to place in the record a statement by Mr. W. T. Evans of Santa Fe, N. Mex. (The communication from Mr. W. T. Evans of Santa Fe, N. Mex., presented by Senator Cameron for the record is here printed in full, as follows:) To the Senate Committee on Public Lands and Surveys: As requested by one of your members there is submitted the following epitome of an experience since the year 1898 in the service of the United States as land law clerk, United States deputy surveyor, United States surveyor, and starved-out homesteader during one of the intervals between. The homestead laws are the "bulk of sales" and to shorten matters as much as possible the suggestions is made that the enlarged homestead act of February 19, 1909 (35 Stat. 639) and all its amendments, be repealed. There is no longer any land adapted to that law, and the only purpose it serves is to get a larger area under the homestead law with none of the mineral reserved to the United States. A large per cent of the final proofs on 320-acre homesteads are accompanied by applications for reduction of the required area of cultivation (sec. 2297 R. S. as amended by act of June 6, 1912, 37 Stat. 123), and all such applications contain the sworn statement of applicant and witnesses that it would be detrimental to the land to plow it up, or it is of such character and aridity that it is impossible to cultivate. Thus it can be seen that a homesteader can "get by" only on 160 acres of good land (sec. 2289 R. S.), or he has to have an area sufficiently large on which to raise enough livestock to pay for his efforts. It is suggested that the stock-raising homestead law of December 29, 1916 be amended in the following particulars: (1) Applicants be allowed to take the 640 acres maximum now permitted Within an area 6, 8, or 10 miles square and that this maximum be made up of incontiguous tracts, if necessary, anywhere within such an area, and the Stock-raising homesteader be compelled to lease all the intervening vacant land at a nominal rental for 10 or 20 years. (2) That the residence requirements of the stock raising law be complied with by residence at any point within the 6, 8, or 10 mile area. (3) Increase the amount of value of improvements required and give the bulk of credit to shelters for livestock during inclement weather, especially in the northern latitudes. (4) Encourage water development by giving the stock raiser a surface title to such areas as he finds within his entered or leased domain that can be used as a source of a permanent water supply or reservoir; or let him have that area under the right of way act of January 13, 1897 (29 Stat. 484), for stock-watering reservoirs, as amended by the act of March 3, 1923 (42 Stat. 1437), without filing annually proof of maintenance. (5) Reserve to the United States all minerals, matalliferous, and nonmetalliferous, within the leased and entered area, the same to be subject to prospecting and entry or leasing at any time. (6) In areas of 6, 8, or 10 miles square that now contain a few patented and unperfected homesteads and a small area of worthless land, allow the actual residents of that area to bid on lease offerings of the remaining vacant lands. (7) In making up leasing areas take parts of adjoining national forests if necessary, and put them under the jurisdiction of that department which has control of the leasing. THE DESERT LAND LAW Allow the desert-land applicant to take land at the local land office without referring the application to the division inspector service of the Interior Department, and let the failure or success of getting a water supply and reclaiming the land be his own funeral; not have the matter held up from one to six years awaiting an investigation of the feasibility of the water supply. Irrigation from wells is no longer an experiment, and no young college graduate can tell just where water is hidden under the surface. THE TIMBER AND STONE LAW Amend the act of June 3, 1878 (20 Stat. 89), so that title may pass with minerals reserved to the United States; or, if in a leased homestead area, that title to the timber only may be passed with surface reserved to the United States. No land can now be entered under the timber and stone law that is covered by any kind of a filing under the leasing act of February 25, 1920 (41 Stat. 437); nor can such an entry be made where land is classified as mineral in character. RIGHTS OF WAY LAWS The rights of way acts, highways (sec. 2477 R. S.); highways over Indian lands, act March 3, 1901 (31 Stat. 1058); railroads, act March 3, 1875 (18 Stat. 482); railroads in Alaska, act May 14, 1898 (30 Stat. 409); railroads on Indian lands, act March 2, 1899 (30 Stat. 990); tramroads, act January 21, 1895 (28 Stat. 635); telegraph and telephone lines, section 5263, Revised Statutes, act February 15, 1901 (31 Stat. 790); act March 4, 1911 (36 Stat. 1253); section 3, act March 3, 1901. Irrigation and drainage, act March 3, 1891 (26 Stat. 1197); stock-watering reservoirs, act January 13, 1897 (29 Stat. 484); and the pipe line right of way provided for by section 27, act of February 25, 1920, are well administered and meet present conditions, except the regulations imposed by the Indian Bureau and the Forest Service are a little too drastic. RECLAMATION ACT AND THE CAREY ACT With the exception of one or two cases, the reclamation act of June 17, 1902 (32 Stat. 382), and the Carey Act of August 18, 1894 (28 Stat. 372), are the failures of the age, due principally to a surplus of " engineering" and not enough "pioneering." Besides, there is not a public-land State in the Union but what has wasted its grant-land heritage from the Federal Government. Repeal both acts and abolish all the bureaus connected with the administration of them. Substitute for these two laws the act of August 11, 1916 (39 Stat. 506), entitled "State irrigation district." This last named act places vacant and entered but unperfected public lands under the State taxation laws to a certain extent and thus meets that oft-repeated statement that some States are impoverished by having so much untaxed Government land within their borders. If the States can not reduce their arid land to beneficial use under the act of August 11, 1916, let them surrender their State form of government and become Territories. THE MINING LAWS The laws relating to metalliferous minerals now embodied in the Revised Statutes have stood the test of time, have proven their worth, and are buttressed by a long line of wise and equitable court decisions. They should not be changed, with the questionable exception, as advocated by some, of reserving surface title and the oil and gas content to the United States. THE LEASING ACT OF FEBRUARY 25, 1920 This is one of the best laws ever passed. It has and will in the future bring in more revenue to the States, and at practically no cost to them, than they could secure if they owned the land and had full control of the same. If any change is made the Federal Government should retain a larger percentage of the proceeds instead of turning it over to the States and to the reclamation fund, 37% per cent and 52% per cent, respectively. ADMINISTRATION OF PUBLIC LANDS AND SURVEYS This subject can not be touched without referring to how during the past 30 years the Field Service of the General Land Office, now designated as the Division Inspector Service, has grown from a minor organization to a moneyeating ogre. It is true that the personnel of that service perhaps too often meet up against political influences with which they can not cope, but it is also true that they are too often overzealous and harm more good people than bad ones. It is perhaps true that a good share of the $180,000,000 spent for traveling and telegraph, commented on not long since by the Bureau of the Budget officer, was used by this division. This division should be abolished and its functions transferred to the Department of Justice, where they belong. Make it mandatory on the land office to refer all complaints and doubtful cases to the local representative of the Department of Justice. And whenever an application under the mining law, the desert land law, or the timber and stone act is presented to the local office, let the local office requisition from an appropriate existing bureau the services of a mineral examiner, a hydraulic engineer, or a timber cruiser to look into the technical part of the proof or application presented. Appoint as registers of local land offices either attorneys or laymen with long experience in public land law and procedure, and not necessarily local residents or grandstand players whose sole object is to conduct self-advertising agencies and enrich their families and relatives (and in some cases religious and fraternal associates) at the expense of the Government. Make more drastic that section of the Penal Code dealing with officers and employees who speculate, directly or indirectly, in public lands and permits and leases under the oil and gas act. THE HOMESTEADER And now for the homesteader who complies only with the letter of the law and not its spirit. A large number of present-day homestead entrymen under the "3-year law" live up strictly to the seven-months residence requirement put on, or allege they do, just enough improvements to pass the final proof and promptly leave the land when proof is accepted. They become nonresident landlords, and such a class is the bane of all countries. This class of people should not be permitted to make entries on lands leased to stock raisers under the proposed homestead leasing law. On the other hand, a real food producer whose circumstances will not permit him to comply strictly with the residence provisions of the law for the first year or two but who later makes his residence continuous (and stays on the land after proof) meets all sorts of woe because he has not complied with the strict letter of the law. Under a long line of equitable decisions by the Department of the Interior, based on the old five-year homestead law, the good faith of the entryman as shown by his acts, was considered the prime requisite. And residence maintained after proof was considered a defense where the entry was attacked after proof but before patent issued and before the expiration of the time mentioned in the act of March 3, 1891 (26 Stat. 1093). It might with propriety be suggested that the remaining public lands be disposed of only to food producers, miners, and lumber producers, with due regard and ample protection to the true pioneer and Little fellow." National parks and national monuments under acts of June 25, 1910 (36 Stat. 847), and June 8, 1906 (34 Stat. 235), should be restricted in area rather than enlarged, unless for the preservation of wild-game animals ferae naturae. Encourage reservation Indians in the production and conservation of game 43213-25-PT 138 animals indigenous to the North American Continent. This should reduce the cost of their subsistence maintenance by the Government and perhaps reduce the personnel of the Indian Bureau. And before leaving the subject of wild animals consider the question of allowing leasees of stock-raising lands to conserve, reduce to possession and domesticate where it can be done, especially with antelope, bison, and elk, as well as other animals whose flesh is edible and whose fur is valuable for clothing. THE FOREST SERVICE This is another institution that has grown into mammoth proportions with a plethora of "white collar" jobs. (See Senator Capper of Kansas for definition.) No one denies that it is advisable and necessary to conserve the forest growth at the headwaters of streams, but it is questionable whether the personnel employed for the administration thereof should have, or assume, the additional duties of leasing grazing land, passing on mining applications, and preventing nearby settlers from gathering the dead and down timber that constitutes a fire menace during the hot summer months. The ratio of swivelchair jobs to outdoor jobs is about 6 to 1 in favor of the former. In Portland, Oreg., the whole second floor of an expensive downtown building is used as headquarters. This is doubtless the case in other localities as well. Just why there should be any need of more than a sufficient quota of timber cruisers and rangers with only one administrative officer and an assistant or two in each district is hard to understand. And why purely local matters of a minor import have to be referred to the forest supervisor at a distant place should be made plain to applicants who suffer inconvenience by delays. It is certain this bureau has contended with its critics and enemies since its creation, and spurred by such has, according to the eulogy over the dead cowboy, "done its damnedest." But it is afflicted by that disease acquired by every petted bureau-exceeding its powers and increasing its pay roll beyond the scope of its duties and authority. The oft recurring forest fires (on the increase annually it seems) are not due to vandals and "sab cats" so much as to rapidly increasing dead stuff and combustible material in all forests. Old Indians of the Pacific Northwest have told the writer that before the white man came, they in order to protect their hunting grounds and food supply would go into the adjacent forests in the early spring and late fall, when all danger of fire spreading had not arrived, or had passed, and burn up all the dead resinous stumps and pine needles so that the same would not be a fire trap during the hot summer months. This same method could be substituted now by allowing (and hiring it done in some cases) nearby settlers and residents to remove for their own use or for sale, all combustible material from the national forests, with suitable punishment meted out to those who destroyed living trees or abused their privileges in any manner. PUBLIC LAND SURVEY If it were not for the statutory restriction (in some cases not noticed by the General Land Office) that only lands covered or occupied by settlement claims be surveyed, and not until then, the public land in continental United States would have been surveyed long before the year 1925. Since 1910 the annual appropriation of from $500,000 to $700,000 with additional expenses for administration and traveling has not reduced the unsurveyed area to an extent commensurate with the amount of money expended. The old contract system in vogue prior to 1910 had its abuses but they have been magnified by propaganda to an undeserved extent. No land surveyed under the contract system cost the government $120 per mile, nor half that sum. For the remaining unsurveyed lands, both reserved and unreserved, return to the contract system with a sufficient change in the administrative force to make it successful and to prevent sabotage on the job. Where the intricacies of the proposed surveys (private grants and court decisions, etc.) demand it, let the advertisement for bids remain out 90 or 120 days instead of 30 days as heretofore, and thus give the prospective bidders an opportunity to investigate the question of transportation, cost of supplies, the legal aspect of the work, etc., before submitting their bids. Do away with the wholly inadequate old mileage rates, the maximum of which was $25 the minimum $5 on per mile, and restrict the bids to a reasonable sum based on a preliminary examination of the locality by a paid employee a surveyor of experience the pay roll of the General Land Office. Let the law and regulations be lenient with regards to extensions of time to complete the work but be exacting in the quality thereof. Let the prospective bidders have full access to the data required for the completion of their work and pay them for retracing old lines where necessary to secure the definite location of their starting point or the closing lines. Allow the money appropriated for this purpose to remain from year to year if necessary and not be turned into the Treasury at the end of the fiscal year. All Government engineering jobs are affected with the practice of using up all the money appropriated "before June 30." Letters of instructions to that effect have been common in times past. GENERAL LAND OFFICE Perhaps some of the criticism herein given applies to the office of the Secretary of the Interior. Wherever it belongs it is due and is given accordingly. Stop the practice of employing young law students in the General Land Office solely for the purpose of allowing them to attend a Washington law school. Let them practice on criminals through the Department of Justice, not on home builders on Government lands; recruit the personnel from the abolished district land offices, and in doing so subordinate those familiar only with accounts to those who have a wide experience with the public land laws and procedure. Stop the practice of sending to district land offices clerks from the General Land Office without any previous experience in local offices and clerks from abolished offices in the prairie States, where only one of the public land laws is applicable. With a competent register in a local land office, or with a corps of competent clerks who can tell an incompetent register where to head in, much of the matter-proofs, applications, etc.-required by the present regulations to be sent to the General Land Office for final action, sometimes causing an interminable delay, could be completed in the local office and thereby save time for the applicants. Also stop the excessive employment in district land offices of inexperienced stenographers, or rather any kind of stenographers without knowledge of land-law proceedure and office duties. A local land office is not a bank, a wholesale house, nor any other kind of a one-track commercial institution. The local land offices now remaining in the United States and bringing in annually a large part of the Government revenue can not be run by a corps of young stenographers and one "wise man." The present day duties of those offices demand an experienced person for each class of work; one who understands his assignment and can use a typewriter. And stop the practice of giving preferential employment to residents of the locality in which the land office is located. It is a public function and appointment to positions therein should not be controlled by local influences. This last might interfere somewhat with the prerogatives of members of your honorable body, but you, as well as other patriots, should make sacrifices. As a further step in reducing the expenses of the Government it might be suggested to abolish the Department of Commerce and transfer its dutiessome too recently assumed-to the Department of the Interior, Labor, and State; abolish the Bureau of Efficiency; the term "efficiency" is a nightmare to some large manufacturing concerns who have had efficiency experts in their employ; abolish the Mexican Boundary Commission. Cut the Indian Bureau to a revenue-producing force. And to Congressmen in general: Do not be guided altogther by advice from chambers of commerce and retail dealers' associations of any kind. In more than one sense of the word there is too much "business" in Government. The very nature of the subject matter compels this paper to be pessimistic in tone wherein the writer picks out the faults of others and overlooks his own, so nothing more is asked than a due consideration of the same with the information and suggestions obtained from others in your tour of the West. Hoping the matter submitted herein will aid you in the solution of the problems confronting you I remain, Very respectfully, W. T. EVANS, Senator CAMERON. Governor Hagerman, will you take the stand, please? |