Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1886-01-09
SOME QUESTIONS FOR THE PEOPLE
OF THE MOUNTAINS.

The following are extracts from bust
ness letter from an old subscriber in a
small hydraulic mining town:
Let me tell you in the commencement
That 1t VIII be utterly impossible for me to send
you single subscriber for the RECORD Union
this coming year. The UNION has always been
my favorlte paper | have read it for the past
twenty-nine years but it has taken such bitter
stand against US miners that we are really preiIl
olced against the Sacramento papers How
many families do you think there are left in
=? Just four. Three out of the four have
been taking the UNION for the last year :
we can afford to take paper that is doing its
pest 10 starye us and deprive our children OF an
education Our school closed last week lust
because there were only four little ones left to
attend. Yours truly,
These expressions serve to illustrate
the necessity for adoption by the people of
hydraulic mining sections to new condi-
lions. We do not entertain the slightest
feeling of ill-wlll toward the people the
epistie represents On the contrary
they and all Others similarly situated have
our profoundest sympathy We have
never, and never shall term them vandals
nor robbers, or indulge in like vituperatiye
expressions concerning them-there is no
strength in such methods. We recognize
the fact that the people of the mining sec
lions, by reason of the long neglect of the
State and Federal Government, have been
permitted to pursue system of mining
that until but recently, comparatively,
they believed to be wholly legitimate We
realize that they have invested heavily.
ha birrlt toI
improvements in the mountains, under the
honest belief that they were justified In
mining the gold from the earth after a
long-aceepted system, and which at least
had the warrant of non-objection on the
part of the State and Federal Governments.
If some of their later methods in
resistance to the mandates of the law.
and in avoidance of the solemn DEGREES of
the Courts into which they were sum
moned for adjudication of their claim of
right, have been harsh, harmful and alto
gether indefensible, we believe the great
heart OF the people of the valley still has
sympathy for them, while at the same time
1t refuses, and must always refuse, to coun-
tenanee their illegal methods.
But this is not question of sympathy at
all. 1t is a question of right and of wrong.
1t is a question of the supremacy of the
law. 1t is more seriously question Of
self-preservation on the part.of the people
of the valley than it can be with the peo-
pie of the mining regions. This
journal has continuously and from
the outset--and for the matter of that.
long prior to any similar expression
being made by any other journal, warned
the people against the dangers of hydraulic
mining, and years ago urged the atten-
tion of the Federal Government
to the work of destruction going
on in the navigable rivers, and
the menace of slickens" to the low lands
of the valley. 1t has uniformly held that
the cause of the valley is right, and it will
not abandon that position. 1t did, for a
time, early in the agitation of the question,
hope for an engineering solution of the
difficulty, and in that hope it was COM
panion to the best thought of the country,
and was supported by the best expert opin-
ions obtainable. Ii was long the hope of
this entire community, that the evil of
slickens descent might be averted, without
totally destroying the mining industry
But as the true condition Of things has
become better known, and the magnitude
of the evil of hydraulic mining upon river
tributaries has been fully realized, it has
become settled opinion that there can DE