The record-union., 1891-09-30
THE PUBLIC DOMAIN.

The San Francisco Chronicle, in at
tempting to reply to Commissioner Car
ter of the General Land Office on the
general subject of granting the lands re-
manning in the public domain to the
States and Territories in which they are
located, says:
Experience has shown that where land
grants OF any kind have been made to the
States in any large quantity, those organized
bodies OF American citizens have not acted
wisely or WELL
1t may well be replied that the Govern
ment of the United States, which had
charge of an extremely large landed
estate, has not acted wisely in any par
ticular. 1t is permitting the denudation
of forests, and converting areas of fertile
land into arid regions. 1t is permitting
the forests of California to pass into pri-
vate ownership, with the power on the
part of the new owner to take every stick
of timber off of his possession: and the
progress made in this direction upon the
Coast Range is bearing legitimate fruit in
destroying streams and reducing the fer
tility of the valleys lying under the
mountain slopes. A little further along
in the history of California, and the Sac
ramento River will go dry before the
middle of July.
The reason why the State of California
would take better care of the timber, re-
quire it to be removed by such methods
as would preserve the forested condition
OF the mountain slopes, is that California
has thousand times more interest in the
subject than the people Of the United
States can have. The Government has
never shown the slightest gleam of in
telligence upon these matters.
This is likewise true of the grazing
areas. Under Government ownership,
the grazing lands of the uplifted plateau
between the Rocky and the Sierra Ne
vada Mountains have been converted
into sandy wastes, exposing surface to
the sun which is increasing the dryness
of the climate. Under Government
ownership, Nevada, Utah, Arizona and
other western Territories are becoming
less fertile.
But the most important matter, and one
entirely overlooked by our contemporary,
is the fact that the people east of the
Missouri River are opposed to the de-
velopment of irrigation works by the
Government. The Farmers Institute of
New York last year passed unanimously
resolution demanding that the Govern
ment should not develop irrigation works
on the ground that the Government
had no right to create a competitor in
the cultivation of agricultural products by
subsidies from the Treasury in this way.
Under State control intelligence would
connect itself Immediately with the land
to be treated; under Government control
knowledge is divorced from the facts of
the situation. The people of the State of
California are vastly more intelligent
upon their needs and upon proper land
system for the disposition of the public
land remaining within its borders than
the Government Of the United States will
ever be. The Chronicle, therefore, asks
that the development of irrigation sys-
TENS shall be left to Congress represent
ing people hostile to such development.
1t also asks that the public domain shall
remain under an administration too
ignorant to appreciate the physi-
cal facts, by which proper
land, forest and irrigation policy shall be
determined. The highest interests of the
people OF California can be depended
upon for right legislation on this subject.
No dependence can be placed upon the
Congress of the United States in the con-
troll and direction of a land policy based
upon the old, obsolete, traditional policy
of permitting settlers to take 100 acres.
This back number conception never had
application west of the one hundredth
meridian. The pretense on the part of
the Government Of opposition to large
land holdings has been pretense from
the very outset. 1t has enacted legisla-
blOh lCIuA1luS 1lllllbdllOA Oh LDe
of timber land which could be obtained
by single claimant, but it permitted the
transfer of the certificate of purchase as
soon as it came into the hands of the
claimant. Itpretended to hold the public
domain for actual settlers, by enacting a
homestead law limiting the exercise OF
the homestead right TO 160 acres But it
made the certificate of purchase negotia-
BILE, and right here in California, under
that system, single individuals have OBJ
tanned patents in their own name to $50
quarter sections of land, which had been
taken up under homestead and pre-
empion laws, by transfer or negotia-
fion of the certificates of purchase.
The policy of the Government of the
United States with reference to the pub
lie domain has been q succession of blum
ders. The great majority of the people
of the United States have no more con-
ception of the physical conditions under
which the lands remaining in the public
domain lie. than if they resided upon an
other planet. The proposition to grant
these lands to the States and Territories,
that their treatment may be controlled by
systems devised in the States and Terri