Kansas agitator. [volume] (Garnett, Kan.) 1890-1905, 1901-09-20
THE KING OF s0uATrkHs,
Ne Has DeAed the United States osarts TO-
Twenty-Five Years

Ne Has Dslied the United States csarts TO-
Twenty-Five Yeara
San Francisco. Cal.-Now that the
United States courts have had several
things to say about Jessie . Carr and
his hundred-mile fsLce, inclosing some
$4,000 acres of government land In
Northern California and Southern Ore
gon. congress may be called upon to
take hand in the matter.
The United State Court here has Or
dered the fences to come down and ths
government property opened up. Carl
has not taken the fence down, and the
government land has not been opened
up. Furthermore. Carr says he is not
going to take the fences down, and adds
by way of explanation that congress Will
be called upon to PASS bill leasing the
government land and that he will be
come the lessee.
That is the latest phase Of the biggest
land fight between a government and an
individual that has ever been waged
The fight has been going on for twenty
Ave years, and while the courts have
decreed and deputy United States mar
shals have gone forth to enforce the de-
crees, Carr has kept his fences up. ana
the $4,000 acres of land have been, to
all intents and purposes, in his posses
sion.
Carr is a "squatter." There are SQUAT
tiers and squatters, but In what the late
Coils P. Huntington used to describe as
"scopiness" the Honorable Jesse d.
Carr leads them all. Beside him the
others fade into insignifcance.
The ordinary squatter ventures to
squat himself into possession OF any
thing from town lot to townsite, but
Carr hasn't bothered with trifles of thai
sort.
He is a squatter on scale 30 extern
siye that it at once commands your I'M
disguised interest and inspires your
secret admiration.
AS a squatter ne possesses q three
fold distinction:
In the extraordinary size of his hold :
ing.
In the way he has barricaded 1t.
In the fight he has made for 1t.
After a quarter Of century Of see
saving with Uncle Sam, Of improvement
making, Of fence-building. of bulldog
hanging on, the law demands that h;
give it up; the law says that his fence
must come down.
Judge Bellinger u the United States
circuit court so decided, and when
a motion for a modification Of the de-
cree was made--a step toward temporiz-
ing-the Carr fence must come down.
The people of Modoc county and OF
Southern Oregon, so 1t is set down III
the complaint against Carr and his hum
dred-mile fence, are much injured by
the existence of that fence. With 1t he
shuts out would-be settlers from that
land, and cattle hungering to Craze OH
its meadows, and with 1t also he shuts
in all the waters of the Clear Lake
watershed, all the lakes, streams, rillD
and springs of that country; and these
things, the people Ct Modoc county set
forth, work them much harm, hence
they pray to have the Carr fence re-
moved.
But, as before remarked, the fence has
not come DOWN.
Jesse D. Carr is an old man now. He
was born year before the battle OF
Waterloo was fought. He was struttinS
in his first trousers when Napoleon was
dying on st. Helena. He lived his
young manhood end prime through
events that are only printed in history
to us of this generation. He is now Ii
hospital here, recovering from an
operation for cataract. He has pulled
through admirably with sturdy stub
bornness.
He is temporarily blind and almost
deaf, but when asked, What are you
going to do about ST" he replied with
vigor and promptne.s and snort of de
fiance:
do about It? Why, fight, OF course!
I've been fighting for that land for
twenty-five years and I'll keep on. Ii
they think to tire me oalt they'll have O.
hard job doing it."
Carr and his code belong to another
period. There is none of the hair split
ling modernness in him, no altrlist,c
nonsense. If he had lived in feuda;
times he would have waxed rich and
strong and powerful as Baron Of his
day.
81 never" he said, by way of preface,
"got picayune, fir ON the time I was IL
years old, that didn't make myself"
And you have" it was volunteered,
"a good many Weayune.,."
4