Alaska sentinel., 1908-02-13


 effectively forbids congressional tutelage beyond the before men toned point of progress in popula- tion and social efficiency.
 But there is nothing more certain than that this literal legality gloss over Alaska's oppression in its recently acquired but solid man. hood needs only a determined ef- fort on the part of the Alaska home builders to strip it off and throw it to the winds of the Pacific. Let Alaska cease to beg few crumbs of good government and boldly de- mand the birthright of every last vest with which to cement step- ping stones further westward for our great expanding race.
 "The Northwest Territory Ordi- nance of 17S7 provided that a tenn porary appointive government consisting of governor and sev- eral law-making judges might be established and continue until the adult male population of the terri tory increased to five thousand, when a permanent and representa- tive government should be per mitted and inaugurated. Further, when the inhabitants of any one of the five divisions of the Northwest Territory should number sixtd thousand, that division had to be admitted to the Union as a new and full-fedged state.
 Comparing Alaska with the average density of population at which other territories were ad- mitted, we find that she has ESQ.,. 900 square miles and a population in 1900 (which has certainly in- creased since), and therefore density of II could hardly make out a case for the whole of Alaska to be given self-government.
 "soUrH ALASKA" PROPOSED
 "But the country north of the Yukon and Tanana basins is pure ly and simply a prospectors' and summer miners country. The tun- dra will not afford basis for agr;- culture. The climate forbids homes for all the year around, i. e. forbids stable democratic communities. Reindeer grazing and the richest of placers would not suffice to at- tract permanent immigration. Why then saddle the rest of Alaska with these 300,0O0 or more square miles which form as novel and distinct a governmental problem as the Phil ippines and their diversified races?
 "The southeastern coast portion of Alaska from Cook Inlet to Dix on's Entrance should be allowed to form separate South Alaska ter
 
 ritory, with the Yukon, Tanana and other central Alaska river val leys, whose commerce and trans portation must always be linked with the coast to the south of them.
 "The present density of popula- tion in this more restricted terri tory is certainly now above the United States territorial average, end the communities which would take the lead in such self-govern- ment have already shown their entire fitness therefor, both in the prosperity and steadiness of inhab- itants and industries.
 South Alaska on the coast would contain the towns of Seward, sitka, Katalla, Ketchikan, Wrangell, Ju- neau, .skagway, Valdez, Cordova, Yakutat, Douglas, Treadwell and Haines. The central Alaska towns also covered by this proposed terri tory would be. Fairbanks, Cinema, Eagle, Ft Yukon, Rampant and Circle City. The proposed South Alaska territory would nso avoid the complications of the Boring Sea seal islands, the Aleutian vol canic islands, and the peculiar AL askan peninsula, all of which will