The Bemidji daily pioneer. [volume] (Bemidji, Minn.) 1904-1971, 1910-05-06

est before the advent OF railroads
have in recent months, after ,secur
ing their government title, aban
doned their homestead tracts and
sought homes elsewhere. This state
of affairs, though deplorable, is true,
and at a gathering of this kind il
seems to me that it is better to con.
slider and discuss the hard facts
confront ourselves with the situa'
ton as it really exists,-rather than
to endeavor to smooth things over by
INDUCING in pleasing fattery or ex.
aggerated statements of the boom
variety.
The pertinent question is: why
are the hardy, courageous settlers
who came here five years and more
ago for the express purpose of &C.
curing homes, and who have since
experienced the hardships of pio-
neers-why are they locking their
cabin doors and seeking homes in
far less attractive localities? =
The answer is plain to one at all
familiar with the real situation. No
roads, no schools, no churches, no
society. Here lies the fault. De.
prived of these essential adjuncts of
development because so much of the
land surrounding that occupied by
settlers is owned by the state, and
the state refuses to join with the
settlers in sharing the burdens of
frontier development. In OF h e Z
words, because the state has adop-
ted the policy of holding its lands
until the settlers shall construct the
roads, drain the wet lands, provide
the needs of civilization, and thus
make the lands valuable and salable,
without cost or effort on the part of
the state. The theory of the state
seems to be to hold on to all it has
and to part with nothing, in the
hope and expectation that after a
few generations this course will
prove the~most profitable. -.
AS to the manner of disposition
of the school lands,-about 10000
acres in this county,-the state is
restricted. These lands were granted
to the state in trust, for the explicit
purpose of being applied to the use
of the schools of the state, and by
its constitution the state solemnly
covenanted with the United States
to so apply them, and prohibited
their sale except at public sale.
The state was not required,
though, to make these lands undesir.
able and unsought by settlers by
enacting that before being offered
for sale they shall be stripped of all
timber. You know the law pro-
vides that Where land valuable for
agricultural purposes contains only
small quantities Of pine, tamarack,
or other timber, the land commits
sioner may in his discretion, either
sell the timber separately, or he may
sell the land as agricultural land and
require the purchaser to pay down
as first cash payment the value of
the timber, in addition to the IS per
cent on the land Neither was it
required to reserve all mineral rights,
which"it has done. -. =. RI
But as to swamp lands, - of
which Koochiching county contains
about 100000 acres.-the condi-
tons of the grant to the state are
altogether different. The purpose
of this grant to the state by the
United States, as expressed on the
face of the the act, was to enable
the state to construct the nece ssary
levees and drains to reclaim them.
The language of the grant is that
the proceeds of said lands, whether
from sale or direct appropriation
in kind, shall be applied, exclusively,
as far as necessary, to the purpose
of retaining said lands by means of
the levees and drains aforesaid. So
it became and is the moral duty of
the state to use, these lands for the
purpose for which the United States
gave them. But the United States
Supreme Court has held that it is
not the legal duty of the state to
fulfill this moral obligation. That
court said, in an opinion written by
Justice Brady in 1882:
Upon further consideration
of the whole subject, we are