Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1880-04-09

If these papers had had the sense to
examine the recent reports of the State
Engineer and Colonel Mendell, or if they
had had the enterprise to send a reporter
to the region already devastated by the
debris, they would have spared themselves
the disgrace which attaches to presumptu-
Gus dogmatism on topics not understood,
and they might have avoided the futility
of setting up an opposition which is be-
meath contempt because of its conspicuous
irrationality. As it is, it becomes necessary
to inform them that the debris question
concerns San Francisco directly as well as
indirectly; that the enormous mass of
material which is being washed down from
the hydraulic mines must, if not checked
and removed, destroy the harbor of that
city, after having ruined the Sacramento
valley that the "few hundred acres ="
endangered are in fact scores of thousands
actually destroyed, and hundreds of thou
sands threatened with speedy destruction;
that the cities of Sacramento and
Marysville, and the cultivators of
the Sacramento valley generally, are de-
pendent for their future safety upon
the action now proposed that San Fran
cisco cannot afford to stand by and witness
the ruin of the wealthiest and most
hourishing portion of the State and that
her demand for the continuance of hydrau-
lie mining, made constantly and en-
phatically, imposes upon her an obligation
to share the burdens necessitated by the
policy she insists upon. If the people d.
rectly injured were left to themselves they
would sue out injunctions against the
miners, and very probably would succeed
in stopping hydraulic mining. But when
that course was proposed general cutlery
was raised, and especially by San Fran
cisco, against the destruction of so i'm
portant an industry. Those who had
studied the question were the more
willing to accede to this expression of
feeling because they saw that the debris
question could not be solved by
merely stopping the flow of debris. That
would only prevent the deposit of
any more debris in the streams. 1t
would not prevent the destruction of farm
ing lands by the material previously de-
posted in the river beds. 1t was seen that
to get rid of this accumulation of debris
it would be necessary to sluice out the
rivers by combining their waters. This
plan alone, in conjunction with system of
dams, could effectually save the menaced
country. But if the farmers were to re-
frain from making their fight in the Courts,
lest in so doing they should ruin an i'm
portant industry, it was clearly the duty
of the community for whose benefit that
industry was to be protected, to assist in
applying the remedy for the debris. That
is the cause of the farmers, and it is in
vulnerable. As to the assertion that the
miners ought to be made to bear all the
cost of the undertaking, it is not worth
consideration, the fact being notorious that
they are not able to do this, and that they
could as well afford to abandon their claims
altogether.
The Young bill is, as we have said,
compromise. It is an endeavor TO make
the fairest possible distribution of the ex-
pense. The State tax levied by it is so
light that it will scarcely be felt The
miners are specially taxed, as they should
be. The swamp land owners are specially
taxed, as they should be- But the bill is
based upon the principle that the interest
of the whole State in the settlement OF this
matter is clear and undeniable, and that
principle we assert to be thoroughly sound
and true. The State requires that hy-
draulic mining shall be maintained there
fore the State is bound to share the cost