The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1909-09-28
WILL ASK BONDS.
Continued from Page one.)

1.-THE regulation of forests in pri-
vate ownership within state boun-
daries is not plainly within the scope
of federal Jurisdiction and it should
be undertaken by the states 1 don't
think that the states have taken up
the matter with as much energy as
they ought and have not improved
the opportunity which was given
estry bureau of the United States.
The question whether the feleral gov
eminent, with the purpose of equal
izing the flow of water in navigable
during the entire year, may enter
upon a plan of regulating forests and
reforesting certain denuded territory
in the states, 1 need not discuss. The
subject would involve a wider dis
cussion than I have time to give it.
Arid and Semi-Arid Lands.
1.-The plan for the government to
manifested by the reclamation act,
has been carried out most rapidly by
the bureau charged with its execu-
ton. I had the honor the other day
ambitious of these projects-aI least
the most difficult of them-the Gun
nison tunnel, which is to bring water
into a valley in Colorado known as
the Uncompaghre valley, with some
10000 acres, and to put it in a con-
dition to grow fruit and cereals.
There are some thirty projects
which have been entered upon by the
reclamation bureau and / believe that
all of them are to be commended for
their excellent adaptation for the
purpose for which they were erected
and for the speed with which the
work has been done. 1t is said, how
ever, that in the planning of a num-
Der of these improvements the en-
thusiasm of the projectors has carried
them to point where they begin to
feel embarrassed in the matter of re-
sources with which to complete the
projects, and begin to show that the
strict limitations of the reclamation
act were not closely observed by those
engaged in executing them; that the
projects were too many and more than
could be completed in a reasonable
time after their beginning, because
of a lack of funds.
Will Take S1O,OOO,OOO or More.
THE reclamation act provides for
the expenditure of funds made up by
the sale of public lands and reimburs-
ed from time to time by the INSTALL
ment to be paid by the settlers who
take up the irrigated land and also
provides that no part of a project is
to be contracted for and begun until
the money for the completion of that
part of the project contracted for
shall be in the reclamation fund. Now,
It appears that it will take $10,000,000
or more, which is not available in the
reclamation fund at present, fully to
complete the projects and it also ap-
pears that a great mum Der of persons
by reason of the beginning of the pro-
jects, have been led into making set
Elements, the expenditure of time and
labor, with the hope and upon the
reliance that such reclamation enter |
prises would be carried through in a
BILE time.
Il think that there is no doubt that
!. was the intention of congress that
projects should not be -nutilated in
such way that they could not be COM
pleted within reasonable time with
the reclamation POUNDS provided by the
sale of public lands and it would pro-
baby have been wiser to adhere strict
y to the limitation thus construed, even
though the language of the act, by di-
Vioing up the projects into parts on
terms, seemed to permit the beginning