The Anaconda standard. [volume] (Anaconda, Mont.) 1889-1970, 1898-04-24
THINGS THAT CONCERN M0NTANANS
Butte's Building and the Forestry Question Are Not En-
tirely Lost Sight or

law of June 4. 1897. specific power TO
suspend. reduce or abolish forest res
erVations. The wholesale suspension
by congress would therefore ppear to
be an ~unjustifiable reflection or the
good judgment OF the executive. n
upon his exercise of a delegated unc
ton.
"2. While II may be argued that the
president can exercise this function
and immediately re-establish all or
parts Of the so nullified. IL
seems improbable that he or any Of his
Successors would feel warranted i'm do
ing SO. in the face of such uncondi-
tional notification as il contemplated
by the senate amendment.
%. II must be presumed that by the
passage Of the act Of March 3. 1891,
empowering the president to set aside
forest reserV3tions and by the repeat
ed application of that act without OBJ
lection. previous to the orders of Feb.
%. 1897. the policy of forest reserva-
ions has been generally approved by
the people. The objection to these
later reservations seems To lie mainly
against the manner i'm which they were
established. But IL does not ppear a
reasonable procedure to destroy the
whole OF the beneficent results OF that
action. merely in order to effect
changes i'm the definition of boundaries
tentatively given.
Il. The 55th congress. in its extra
session, devised and ordered the ra-
tional method of correcting possible
mistakes in the limits of the reserva-
tions. to-wit: To survey and examine
the reservations. meanwhile suspend
ing the final establishment until a
given date. II was assumed that the
information needful To adjust the
boundaries would be secured before
that date. though the appropriation for
the surveys was not conditioned upon
such action.
'5. II the objection now made to a
continuance of the reservations is
based upon the absence of the neces-
sary information upon which a suita-
BILE adjustment of the boundaries can
be made, we submit that senate docu-
ment 1S9 shows that a large portion OF
such Information has been already OBJ
tanned. II seems probable that the
completion of the work OF collecting IL
will be accomplished under current APP
propriations within a reasonable m
In his favorable report on the bill TO
open the Fort Maginnis military reser-
walton Senator Carter proposes to
amend the bill SO that any entry here
tofore made in good faith by a legally
qualified person upon any of the eN-
cIuded portions of said Fort Maginnis
military reservation shall, IL regular in
form and free from adverse claim, be
held valid: and the secretary of the
interior. upon application OF the entry
man. IL made within m year. is di-
rected. where adverse interests have
not interviewed, To r%einstate such en-
tries as he may have Cancelled because
of a construction based upon the opin-
fon that the laws did not apply to the
abandoned portions Of the reservation.
He says: The bill. with the proposed
amendment. cannot impair any exist
ing right or interest nor prejudice any
lawful claimant. At the same time.
the lands embraced in this reservation
being i'm a comparatively new and
sparsely settled region. no good reason
exists why they should not he made
subject to entry and location under
the general land laws OF h United
states"
Commissioner of the Land Office
Hermann in a favorable recommended
ton of the bill to the secretary of the
interior says: The agricultural lands
have been surveyed and the area
thereof found to be 2i.159.53 acres. The
unsurveyed portion of the reservation
Is estimated To be 6. 1896 acres. The
entire estimated area is. therefore. 3d.
500. ~ acres. The area of the reseTva-
ton being i'm excess of 5000 acres, and