The Ely miner. [volume] (Ely, Minn.) 1895-1986, 1911-01-06
pe,art.nent of state Lands.

L
With the organization to that end of a
separate state land department. is now gen
raiiy admitted II the state OF Minnesota
ouy the same. in my opinion the law should
20 so amended as to permit of sales beins
made every day in the year by the respec-
I've county auditors, and upon terms, that
While fair not only to the state and the set
| tier, will also be in the nature of inducement
the latter, and a separate land department
organized
Before reforms in our land laws be
carried into legislative effect, however, II
appears wise and apparently legally neces-
sary to submit the proposition to the people
IN the form OF constitutional amendment.
In order that the state lands may be
sold to best advantage it is very desirable
that sales should be made at all times on
lands, but this involves legal question and
| also one of public policy.
1t is not necessary that the policy OF
public sale, as required by constitution,
should be entirely abolished. When the
public lands have been properly appraised
the commissioner should be authorized to
make sales to bona fide settlers at all times
and still continue to make smaller public
thirty or sixty days, when in his judgment
the public interests can best be subserved
thereby.
Neighboring states, owning only a small
fraction of public domain as compared with
ours, have separate land departments, while
in Minnesota the land commissioner for
nifty years has been his own auditor, with
no direct and systematic daily check upon
his land, timber, and mineral transactions
departments and business. except the one
or two examinations by the public examiner
phase of our land business. No one realizes
the public wisdom and necessity of amend
ing the old system improvised in pioneer
days, more keenly than the state auditor
himself. as shown by his report.
Department of Forestry.
The original forest area of Minnesota is
estimated at over one-half of the total land
surface OF the state. or approximately U.s.
100000 acres. The present forest area may
be estimated covering less than one-fourth
acres.
OF our total wooded area 12O4,4S6 acres
are set aside as q national forest reserve
and nearly 100000 acres more represent
unsurveyed government forest lands largely
IN the Indian reservations, making total
ment holdings in Minnesota. The state for
est reserves aggregate about 10000 acres.
counties now partly covered by forests is
estimated by the forest commissioner at
about twenty billion feet, nearly one-half
of which is supposed to be pine At the
present average lumber cut of billion feet
a year, it would take about twenty years,
without the help of forest fires, to complete
the denudation of a state which once had
one of the greatest and most varied forest
areas.
placing the public forest under scientific
and business like administration were so
plain to the general public and to the mem
bers of this legislature, that argument should
be unnecessary. The state has just eXperi-
nection with the Rainy River Valley forest
fires. which should be sufficient to demon
! strate the necessity of improved forest ad-
ministration. But the Hinckley, Chisholm
and Beaudette fires, with their losses aggre-
eating millions of dollars worth of property
and many human lives, tell only part of the
sad story. To this we must add losses by
trespass and depreciation, and loss by neg
onnortunfties fns reforestadon "e sfimaf
ed that the aggregate forest resources of
Minnesota are worth 500, 000,0 900, which is
ctr ncciIl Con do
quate methods of protection, development
and administration.
The state also has large area of cut
over lands that are valuable chiefly for re-
forestation, and the same applies to a con-
siderable area of our swamp lands. When
we read the reports of European state for
ests and note what earnings derived
from forest lands, we begin to appreciate
that timber is one of the most valuable crops
that soil may produce and that land of little
or value for farming may be made a
generous revenue producer by scientific for
estry.
In scientific forestry administration Swed-
en- for example has made wonderful progress.
increased from $500, 900 in 1880, to 81, OO0, 900
year at the present time. In 35 years,
Sweden by purchase and reforestation has
increased it's state forest area As per- cent,
100000 acres thereof being acquired by
purchase. During, similar period Mime
sofa has received nearly ten times that
amount in government grants, without a
dollar of expense for Investment. Mime
sofa today consumes about double the
amount of lumber which it produces, while
Sweden, next to Russia, is the greatest ex-
porter of lumber in the world.
The forest problems of state have been
sadly neglected. For protection against for
est fires, Minnesota spends less than one
fourth of what is required for effective
results, and in the way of practical forest
administration conducts only few scattered
experiments with nothing like a compre-
hensiye scientific and businessike system of
forestry. The cost of forest fire protection
should be borne by the benefited forest
property on the basis of insurance risk
share OF the cost. On this basis, the cost of
fire protection need not be materially in
creased against the general taxpayer, and
then only as he gets liberal returns for in
surance against loss.
AS showing that timber lands justify
on business grounds reasonable expenditure
for administration I present herewith the
auditors statement of pine lumber cut from
Minnesota state lands for the past six years:
L Arat.a