The Alaska citizen., 1910-09-19
POWER OF ATTORNEY.

Just as have said to the chair man of this committee in private conversation, want to say 10 the committee that in my judgment there are two matters that are of supreme importance 10 the Territory of Alaska One is a good railroad lava transportation law; and the other is the subjeetmatter in this bill think they are the two most important matters in regard to Alas ka today
 l. was with this statement that Delegate Wickcrsham closed his ar gument. before the committee on the territories of the House of Repre- scntatiyes last April, for his bill for the amendment of the mining laws relating to Alaska. Ii is with this same idea uppcrmost in his mind. he tells us. that he goes back to Wash ington to continue his fight 10 get for Alaska such remedial legislation as she stands in need of
 And no one who has studied con ditons in Alaska will hesitate to in- dorsc the Delegates statement that railroads and proper mining laws are the most crying needs of the cOun- try today But if it were left to the decision of the men who are the f it would be declared that some changes in the mining laws are need ed even more than are better means of transportation.
 For instance. here is a country opening up to the north of Us, the Beaver river district In this case the new strike is made in a part of the country comparatively easy 10 get at, but il would have been just the same if it had been more remote and much more inaccessible the pros pectors would have gotten there It has been demonstrated times beyond number that travel difficulties can
 
 more than do the hardships of an Arctic winter But there is one thing that does give him pause and force him to ask himself if it is worth while taking chance, and that is the pencil and hatchet hog.
 In the Beaver district today there should be room for every fOOt-lOose man in the district to take a chance" with, judging from what can be learned of the country, a fair ul- innate prospect of hitting something better than wages. And there would he if the skeleton of the United States mining law were so dressed. as it is in every other territory and state. as to fit local conditions. But as it is, those going to the new district find there have been ahead of them half dozen men armed with good stout pencils, the right to stake association claims, and pow CTS of attorney, material or imagined sufficient to stake the whole coun- try several times over. They find two or three men actually at work on ground that would take several hundred to properly prospect; and if they have not sufficient capital to buy in, they must needs look on that part of the domain as closed to them until such time as it shall have been developed sufficiently to afford them chance to work for wages.
 To abolish this association claim and power of attorney evil Delegate Wickersham made a good fight at the last session of Congress. He was opposed to some extent, by At torney Fink, of Nome, whose ob- jections were very evidently made on behalf of corporations he represent ed. The chief objections to his bill, however, were made by Senator Bal finger, acting through Frank Pierce, the assistant secretary of the inter- for. MT. Pierce appeared before the committee and dvulged, at great length, what he did not know of conditions in Alaska. Punctuating his remarks frequently with the state ment that he had practiced mining law for twenty years, this gentle man pugnaciously opposed the Dele gates bill in detail steadfastly refusing the request of the commit tee, although acknowledging defects in the existing law, to suggest sub- stitute.
 This is how he voiced his objection to the section abolishing the power of attorney:
 For some reason or other mining Is not progressing there as favorably as it ought to, and instead of peo- pie going in there and developing the