Santa Fe daily New Mexican. [volume] (Santa Fe, N.M.) 1885-1897, 1896-05-23
W. c. WYNKOOP CALLED DOWN
Gross Misrepresentation Respecting
Status of Canada de COchiti Grant
Case Exposed.
ALCALDES NOT HIGH JUDICIAL OFFICERS
Supreme Court Has Not Passed on Vital
Issue Involved in Cochiti Case
Miners Have No Doubt of
Finally Winning.

Mr.. W. C. Wynkoop is an active mem
Der of the Denver syndicate that secured
interests in the Cochiti land grant after
the discovery of mineral in the hills near
Bland, that undertook to expand said
grant so as to cover these mineral bear
ing hills, that wes disastrously defeated
il its Efforts to induce the United States
court of private land claims to confirm
its pretensions to the immensely expand
ed grant and that has appealed from the
Just decree of the able, learned and i'm
partial court just mentioned to the United
States supreme court. Mr.. Wynkoop re-
Gently voiced his views and those of his
associates on the subject of the grant in
carefully prepared interview, published
in tine Denver Republican of May 20.
He prefaces his remarks by saying: ~
will not attemp pit to give the legal side of
the case as lawyer would state it," This
invitation to the public charitably to
view his observations as those of lay
man rather than lawyer was eminently
wise beginning in the light of what fol.
lows, for no reputable lawyer would
have had the hardihood to make public
such absurd misstatements of both fact
and law as he INDUCED n-misstatements
that can only he excused on the plea of
ignorance amounting to the innocence of
first or second childhood
AN uNDIspuTED PROPOSITION.
He truthfully says that "the United
States court of private land claims held
that the Canada de Cochiti grant was
good" and that "the only question was
about the boundaries" but he carefully
omits to mention that, after the most
thorough preparation on the part of all
concerned and most exhaustive and i'm
partial hearing, the land court distinct
ly decreed that the grant embraced alto
gether only about 5000 acres, instead of
about $4,000 acres as claimed in the petit
tion, and that the grant as confirmed COW
cred no port of Allerton or Bland and no
part of the Oochiti mining district. He
omits to mention that the original and
much mntilated grant document alleges
that "this grant was made in 1928 upon a
petition of one Antonio Lucero, in which
he asked for piece of land at the mesa of
belled retreated, to plant thereon; the
said piece of land will contain about ten
fanegas of wheat and two of corn (e5out
thirty-three acres), and to pasture his
sheep and horses" but does untruthfully
represent that "the evidence showed that
the grant was given to Antonio Lucero
by the king of Spair in 1728." As a
matter of fact the grant claimants simply
contended that the grant was made to
Lucero by "Bustamante, governor of the
province of New Mexico" and it was not
pretended that the king of Spain was
party to the transaction, further than he
might have been rendered so by the action
of Bustamante.
JURIsDICTIoN OF ALcALDEs.
Then Mr.. Wynkoop proceeds to say
that in 1865 "there was litigation between
the widow and heir Of Antonio Lucero,"
and that sthe case was heard before an.
alcalde, the highest judicial officer in
New Spain, as New Mexico was then
called, and it related to the boundaries of
the grant. These boundaries we're held
BY the alcalde to be rs the grant claim
ants say they are, and as the United States
land court says they are not" This is
truly refreshing. Persons who possess
any knowledge whatever regarding the
old Spanish government in New Mexico
know perfectly well that, instead of being
"the highest judicial officer" the alcalde
equivalent to justice of the peace) was
the most inferior and powerless tribunal
in the domain, that he had no jurisdiction
except in cases of minor moment, and
even then that his acts were subject to
be annulled by the alcalde mayor (about
equivalent to district judge, that the lat
ter was inferior to the ]uez superior or su-
preme judge, and that the acts of all these
ssiudicial officers we're without effect un-
less approved by the governor, whose
power was supreme.
It is true, as Mr.. Wynkoop intimates,
that tho claimants of the expanded grant
relied chiefly upon the alleged adjudica-
tion of an alcalde, and that, in the light
of all the evidence casting dense cloud
of grave doubt and utter improbability up
ON the pretended "decree of the alcalde,"
the land court brushed aside this vital
feature of the case with the remark: