The San Francisco call., 1898-04-17
UNCLE SAM
 CHECKS MONITORS
But They Are the Hydraulic Ones in the Noun
 tainS.
Far Reaching Decision by Federal Engineers Defining "Hydraulic
 Mining"

Uncle Sam has told Californians what hydraulic mining is. As hydraulic mining was invented Tn California and here achieved its vast development, this may sound odd to some but in fact the hydraulic miners, mining engineers and lawyers of this State have not known un- til now what the definition of the term is.
 This refers mainly to the legal sense of the term, of course, and the great i'm portance of the exact legal sense of the term and the conflict over 1t that has long ragged make Uncle Sans decision of the question the most important ruling af- fecting mining interests that has come forth for long time.
 The ruling is announced by the Federal engineers composing the California Debris Commission-Colonel Suter, Major Heuer and Lieutenant Deakyn. After months of consideration, the commission has just communicated to Attorney John M. Wright, chairman of the committee on dredging of the California Miners Asso- citation, the brief announcement that the commission defines hydraulic mining to be mining by means of water delivered under pressure through nozzle"
 1 his simple looking definition means that the Federal engineers who regulate hydraulic mining on the watersheds of the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers, under the Caminetti law, will assume that that law and their jurisdiction cov- CTS the washing of old tailingS, of piles of gravel tunneled out of drift mines, etc., II water is applied through a nozzle under pressure" This is an application of the law against which there has been much -opposlLon among the miners.
 Until the Caminetti law was passed in 1893 the term hydraulic mining" had never been written in a statute unless in- c1uentally, and had never been fully de- fined by a court. The Caminetti law pro- vided that for it's purposes the term should have the meaning and applica- ton given to said terms in said State This left a fine field for study and dis pute. A monitor playing on the side of a mountain was hydraulic mining plainly enough, but between this and ordinary siuicing in other placer mines. which the March 24, 1893, the State Legislature de- fined hydraulic mining to be mining by the application of water under pressure against natural bank But this det- hilton was not in existence when the Camnetti law was approved three weeks before.
 Under this State definition if a miner turned a giant on a pile of old tailings or on gravel drifted out from under lava beds or even on a gravel bank broken down with dynamite he would not b9 working a natural bank, and so would not be engaged in hydraulic mining and subject to the Caminetti law. The deflni- uons given by many mining authorities have been compiled, but they vary and were not framed for legal use or with the present situation in view. At the last State miners convention in October there was warm discussion for several hours over resolution to have presented to Congress a bill defining hydraulic min ing, as it has been defined by the State Legislature, but the matter was dropped Last fall the Anti-Debris Association brought the issue up by beginning pro- ceedings for the first time against drift mines In Nevada County using water under pressure on gravel taken out, but the suits were dropped.