Bismarck daily tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, Dakota [N.D.]) 1881-1916, 1904-01-16
WHAT HILL SAYS or IRRIGATION.

President Hill Of the Great Northern
Talks to Farmers Of Irrigation and
Agriculture. %
James J. Hill made an address be-
fore the Minnesota State Agricultural
Society this week, in which he talked,
among other things, Of irrigation and
agriculture, and his statements will
be read with interest. He said:
There was time when our popular
campaign song was "Uncle Sam Is
Rich Enough to Give Us All Farm"
Today he has not any farms to give us
that we can cultivate. All Of the agri-
cultural land that can be cultivated
without irrigation is gone and the peo-
pie are selling their homes in the
United States and moving out into,
Northwestern Canada, west Of Winni-
peg, where they can buy land at from
Sc to $40 an acre. More people have
gone there than many of our men
would like to acknowledge. They
have a large area of country. A couple
Of months ago, at Bismarck, made
statement in regard to their country,
and was to some extent misquoted, and
will take occasion to correct it. They
have an area north of us equal, prac-
tically, to that of the United States.
Only a comparatively small portion of
that can be cultivated with profit. They
probably have an area three times that
of Minnesota, where they can cultivate
the land with profit, and they raise
good crops. North of that it is too
near the north pole.
As the elimination of an effort on
the part of few of us who were trying
to foresee and provide, before it was
too late, homes for the expanding
population of this country. six railroads
agreed to contribute $4,000 year each
for five years, in order to send men
about the country to lecture; to call up
on the gentlemen who were charged
with our public legislation, to impress
upon them the necessity of preserving
the public domain for the people of the
country. After five years, hard work
congress took the matter up, passed a
bill providing that the government
should undertake the irrigation of such
portions of the country as could be
easily irrigated, and to secure those
lands, where settlers might homestead
and pay for the land after living upon
it for five or ten years, no committing
rights, no committing settlement, but
actual homestead; living upon the land
for five or ten years, they might then
become the owner, paying price OF,
say, $40 an acre, which would be less
than half the value of the land. Well,
now, there are two states in which the
government has undertaken the re-
clamation Of arid land--Nevada and
Arizona. You can imagine what kind
of homestead a man could make in
Arizona. If he had an umbrella
think he would be reasonably safe
from sunstroke If he sat still in the
field. They do put water on these
lands and raise prunes and apricots
and fruit, with peon labor, and the
land sells as high as 5000 and $3.50 an
acre. But how is that going to help
the man who wants to raise family
Of children on farm? "
Tt is disappointment to those Of us
who have put our hand into the cam
paign of education. The politician has
got his hand in, and I think you will
find the politician has got his hand in
to the deal where the land is irrigated.
I get so out Of patience with them +
have got to talk plain to them and call
spade spade. ~
thought you might like to hear our
platform, the work that our organiza-
ton is doing now. II got this day or
two ago and thought would bring It
with me. It reads: ~. ri, Wy ny !.
what we advocate: -. ~ st
81. That not another acre Of public
lands shall ever hereafter be granted.
to any state or territory for any pur-
pose whatsoever, or to anyone other
than, an actual settler who has built
his home on the land and lived on It
for five years. (Applause.) :.
"2 That the national government
shall build the irrigation works neces-
sary to bring water within reach Of
settlers on. the public lands. the cost
of such works to be repaid to the gov
eminent by such. settlers in annual in
stallments without interest. (Applause)
t"t3. That the timber and stone act,
the desert land act and the commute
ton clause Of the homestead act shall
be repealed. and that all public timber