Los Angeles daily herald., 1888-01-29

work of acquiring title to the publ
lands through the perjury and suborn
alton of perjury of scullions and dunn
mics employed for this service. II
this prostitution of our land laws t.
the base uses of theft and plundeI
do not speak at random, but ol
the authority OF ascertained facts.
shall only refer to the proceeding
of a single term of the Unite'
States Court held in Santa Fe las
spring. On the trial o numerous per
ties for perjury and subornation o
perjury in procuring land titles, AM
conspiracy to defraud the Government
through the corrupt use of our lan'
laws, eighty-eight persons availet
themselves OF the statute of limitation
and thus confessed their guilt. Th'
testimony developed the fact tina
many of these men had been pai(
from five to ten dollars each to sigl
certain title papers, and that the.
never saw the land and neve
attempted to occupy or improve it
while the men who hiret
them to swear falsely solo
the tracts to an Iowa cattle
company. All this is well known tt
Mr.. Dorsey, and that these mel
would not have escaped the peniten
tiary if the Republican officials of the
Territory had done their duty in Sc
curing indictments in season. Bu
Mr.. Dorsey says "there is not a grair
or shadow of truth in the charge
that land frauds have been committed
in New Mexico "to any extent" II
speaking of an accomplished scoun
drel of the last century, Thomas Car
lyle says: "There was not truth
enough in him to make a real lie of. ,
l sus pect that Mr.. Dorsey is his linea.
But hear him further. In speaking
of the right of the citizen to take 16(
acres of land, and pay for it as desig-
mated by law at the rate of 1926 per
acre, he says: "The person entering
this land must swear that he is doing
it for his own use and benefit, and
not with the view of selling it," This
is true, but in the cases just cited,
which are mere samples of New Mex
ican frauds, the men who pretended
to enter their tracts swore falsely, and
the lands passed at once into the
clutches of cattle company, just
as Mr.. Dorsey is we'll understood
to have secured the title to
his lands on the Una de
Cato Grant, and he defends
his disgraceful perversion' of the
pre-emption law. He says: Before
the title passes to the pre-emptor he
pays the Government the price of the
land," and that "the Government is
not defrauded" 1t is true the Gov
ernment does not lose the price OF the
land, and, therefore, according to this
logic, if Mr.. Dorsey can hire one hun
dred middle-men for a few dollars
each to ACQUIRE that many quarter
sections of land by perjury, and con-
vey them to him, it is a legitimate
business. The pre-emption law, it is
true, only permits one person to ac
1uire' on hundred and sixty acres Of
land, but on the Dorsey plan he can
acquire one hundred thousand, and
that law thus becomes the instrument
through which the great curse Of
monopoly, which it was designed
10 prevent, is fastened upon the coun-
try. Everybody knows that the pre-
emption law subordinates the question
of revenue to the policy of actual set
tlement and tillage in small home
steads. When it was passed, in 1S4l,
the Treasury was full to overfowing
from the proceeds of sales Of the pub
lie lands in large bodies for specula-
tive purposes, thus finally hinderng
the settlement and development of
the country. After a long wrangle
in Congress our ugly "surplus" was
divided among the States and we
entered upon new dispensation, in
spired by the purpose thereafter to
dedicate the public lands to the use
of the landless men who would
appropriate them in
limited allotments. Not revenue,
but the settlement of the lands
was the dominating policy; and this
was afterwards still more strongly
in the passage Of the
homestead law. But the moral vision
of Mr.. Dorsey sees nothing wrong in
nullifying both these laws, and max.
ing them the engines of monopoly and
robbery, through the detestable agen-
cies of bribery and perjury. AS have
shown, he denies, absolutely, that any
frauds have been committed under
them in New Mexico, and then braz-
emily defends the very villainies have
upon him and his kind. Such
is the gospel of Gland stealing" ac-
cording to st. Stephen. 1t is Dorsey
ism, pure and simple, in its unveiled
ghastliness; and l turn away from it
and mercifully draw the curtain over
it while 1 proceed with my task.
He asserts that have charged the
Supreme Court OF the United States
with joining hands with the plunder-
ers of the public domain. There is
not sentence or word in my article
which can be tortured into any such
and Mr.. Dorsey, who care
fully read it for the purpose of reply,
knows this to be true.
He says that my article implies that
all the Secretaries of the Interior
from 1861 to 1885, all the Commits
sioners of the General Land Office,
and all my predecessors in office,
were dishonest and corrupt men.
This statement is gross exaggeration,
and it is, moreover. mere begging
of the question. Quite number
of the officials referred to are involved
in my exposure, and the records OF
the Government will identify them.
Are my facts authentic? Mr.. Dorsey
makes no attempt to controvert them,
which he certainly would have done
if he had been able, but with uplifted
hands and the whine of a convict,
begs that the officials whom have
arraigned as his accomplices shall be
shielded from the right OF search.
Mr.. Dorsey says the Committee on
Public Lands OF the House of Repre-
sentatives during the time l was its
chairman, reported favorably bills
granting land to railroad corporations
covering more than half of all the land
granted to railroads in the United
States which bills passed Congress as