Mohave County miner., 1882-12-03
MINERAL PARK, DECEMBER 3, 1882.
ASSE SSEEENT WORK.

EDITOR MoHAvE COUNTY MINER:- You claim that your paper is devoted especially to the mining interests of this county. Such being the case will you be so kind as to tell me what in your opinion constitutes a sufi- cient amount of work to hold a min ing claim, mother words what does the term Assessment Work" mean iii a legal sense. There seems to be a good deal of dispute among miners on this subject and I should like to see this assessment work business fully discussed i'll your paper.
 Respectfully yours,
 PRosPFCToR.
 We are glad to receive the above communication from ''Prospector," although it is a somewhat difficult matter to answer 1t, as there seems to be a great diversity of opinion as to what really constitutes legal amount of assessment work. How ever, in view of the great importance of the subject to miners generally throughout the county, we have de voted considerable time to the solu- tion of this question and have ar rived at the following results, which we give for what they are worth:
 In the first place on consulting the Revised Statutes of the United States, ye find in Section 2324 the fol lL2Sfng: eTSesiseTs of eaGas-mining dis trict may make regulations not il1 conflict with the laws of the LT>+od States or with the l2Gs.SI6e I6e State or Ierr1t1ry4n which the district is sEe6 governing the location, man ner of recording, amount of work necessary to hold possession of a mining claim. subject to the follow ing requirements: On all claims To- cated prior to the 10th day of May. 1872, ten dollars worth of labor shall be performed or improvements made by the 10th day of June, 1874, and each year thereafter, for each one hundred feet in length along the vein until a patent has been issued therefor On each claim located af- ter the 10th day of May, 1872, and until a patent has been issued there for, not less than cue hundred dol lars worth of work shall be per- formed or improvements made dur ing each year."
 The various acts passed by the legislature of this Territory at differ ent times contain nothing relating to assessm ent work except repetltions Of the above.
 At regular annual miners meet ing of the miners of Wallapai min ing district held November 4th, 1872 the following resolution was adopted:
 Resolved, that twenty days work be considered equivalent to one hun . dred dollars done on ledge.
 We presume this to mean one hun red dollars worth ot work done on a
 ge. This resolution was passed
 years ago and wages were most
 five dollars per day for miners
 time, and if so, twenty days
 kpuld be equivalent to one RuA AAred dollars expended on claim. But all this is changed now and wa gesNare down to four dollars a day and have been so for years, and we must be governed entirely by the krnliGg rate of wages, in other words
 sum of one hundred dollars must 5ually be paid out for labor, and pether the rate be one dollar or five gr day makes not the slightest differ bce45-4s 445t-4asscc-11eSimed by great many 1t the cost of poNder and tools " be taken into copsideration and S .aSH part of the one hundred dol rs Necessary to be expended. We nnot and never have taken this =. of the subject, and maintain hat if such had been the meaning utent of the act, that Congress
 most certainly have inserted a
 On to that effect. But it does
 thing; it says distinctly "one
 dollars worth of work shall
 ned or improvements made"
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