The Irish standard., 1905-06-24

! spicuous example. But for the most
part the apparent listlessness does moi
! rest with the district attorneys.
1t is congress more than any Other
branch of the government which Is
chargeable with full and guilty knowl
edge of this stupendous crime. Not
only do the thieves themselves and
their chosen representatives sit in the
seats of the mighty in both senate and
house, watching lest something un
toward befall, but time and again con
gress has taken this huge graft openly
into account, making it an element in
committee-room and lobby jockeying.
Isn't it a pretty spectacle to see a
young and powerful state like Oregon
discredited before the nation by hav-
ing a senator and all its representa-
tives under Indictment as thieves and
conspirators against the general gov
eminent?
In no other single phase of the pub
lie land service of the United States
is the degradation of the law to GRIM
inal ends more clearly shown than in
the administration of the homestead
act. Vast as have been the stealing
under the timber land, the mineral
land and the desert land acts, they
become trivial, almost inconsequent,
when compared with the offerings
under the homestead law.
An act of national legislation, de-
signed to conserve the public domain
and to secure its ultimate distribution
among the actual settlers, for pur-
poses of home-malling, has been de-
liberately and Systematically prosti-
tuted to make a cloak for theft; the
officers of the law have been corrupt
ed to act in collision with the thieves
often outright and directly, or else
what is hardly better in principle
and equal in effect-by indirection
through that silence which can be in
terpreted only as consent
First and last, since the year 1890,
when the systematic development of
the big ranch" began, a mere hand
full of plotters, working under cover
of the national homestead law, have
segregated public lands of an area
greater than that of any country of
Europe-larger than France, larger
than Austria Hungary, more than
twice as large as all of Great Britain.
And let it be kept in mind--for this
is in one sense the gist of the whole
arrative-that this huge graft has
been made possible and has prospered
only through the connivance of land
office agents and employees. I shall
call attention to this feature of the
matter again and again, insisting upon.
it. Here is the blacklist spot, and the
one that most needs whitening.
am not guessing, theorizing or en-
ploying the empty phrase of mere SEN
sationalism. For many years an Or
ganized gang of thieves has prac
tically dictated the appointment of
those department. officials who were
intended to be used. To put it mildly,
nine out of ten appointees in the land
service in the last fifteen years in the
newer parts of the west have been
men of special fitness-not all down
right and irreclaimable villains, under
stand, but at least men with a genius
for looking the other way at the right
time, or for blinking troublesome
workings of the laws. A free transla-
ton of the working code makes it
read: None Of puritan conscience
need apply" If by mischance some
stickler for form has got into Office
and threatened to disorganize the es-
tablished order Of things he has lived
Very unpleasant life in the short
time elapsing before he concluded to
resign his job.
Should the register or receiver of
almost any land Office in the cattle
grazing districts Of these states ap-
pear at his desk some morning and re-
fuse point blank to accept any more
filings Of final proofs in homestead
claims which he knew or had excel
lent reason to believe were tainted
with fraud he would most likely be
suspended from Office at the instance
of his patrons pending inquiry into his
mental condition.
No reference Is made to the trans
actions of the actual settler, who, for
one reason or another, misses strict
conformity with the terms of the stat
ute. He may be out of luck or merely
careless, but so long as he is a veri-
table homesteader western ethics hold
him blameless. The man who needs
rigorous application of plain speech
is he who never was and never in
tends to be a settler, who is the mel'
est hfreling dummy of the land-grab-
hers, and who in no sense of the word
fulfills the law-who for diminutive
consideration rakes quarter. section
out Of the general burning to swell
the domain of his lord. Perjury and
theft; these two ugly instruments are
the ones employed.
It would be hard to discover when
the homestead frauds had their begin
ming. Doubtless they have been prac-
..tfced from the day when the first