The Chitina leader., 1912-10-29
Conservation Faddists Arrest Pro- gress and Seek to Supplant Self Government With Bureau
 cracy
By GEORGE E. BALDWIN

By treaty SeSSiOn Ol loot tue lu- habitants of Alaska were guaranteed all the rights of American citizens. Nearly a generation ago the mining laws of the United States were ex- tended to Alaska; over thirteen years ago laws were passed by Congress providing for an extension of the homestead laws to the territory. Eleven years ago the coal-land laws of the United States were extended to Alaska. For over thirty-five years after Alaska came under the Stars and Stripes not a whisper was heard against the idea that Alaskans were to receive the same just and generous treatment from the general govern ment as had been accorded pioneers from the days of Daniel Boone. Suddenly there arose school of political economists that found out that everything done in the past had been wrong; that our statesmen had been fools or knaves, or both; that our pioners had been vandals and thieves. A campaign was started that for venom and deliberate lying has never been equaled m the history of the country.
 Alaska, being without a vote, was made the target for all these theo- riZing cranks. Every scheme the mind of political faddist could con ceive was proposed for Alaska.
 The present inhabitants and their rights were to be disregarded, the re- sources of Alaska managed as an es- tate, the government debt was to be liquidated, superannuated employees of the government pensioned, and a mere trifle of seventy or eighty thou sand dollars paid to every man, wo- man, and child in the United States, all out of the resources of that un- fortunate territory.
 A few of these fanatics actually be- lieved in the practicability of such preposterous ideas,-ideas that make the dreams of John Law or Colonel Mulberry Sellers seem tame and paltry.
 In my opinion it is compliment to call people with such ideas driveling diots. But perhaps they were not all so idiotic. Some of them like Hamp- tons Magazine, were probably paving the way for monstrous swindles, get ting their dupes into the habit of thinking in big figures, and when the crash came their victims could con- sole themselves that their share of Alaska loot would soon come along and make their loss look like thirty cents.
 The real leaders of this movement, while perfectly willing and anxious that the people should be duped by crazy communists, were playing for what was to them a higher stake. While advocating the rule of the peo- pie, initiative, referendum, recall, etc., their goal was that all the land and resources of the government should. be placed in the hands of | bureaucrats of their own selection in Washington, whose authority would very necessities of life upon the whim or caprice of appointive officials whose power no court is authorized to curb, and this hideous system comes to us labeled reform.
 For six years, at the behest of these doctrinaires, a portion of our laws has been suspended One of the re- sources of our territory, upon the de. velopment of which depends the pro. gress and prosperity of many indus tries, is absolutely locked up.
 When it comes to a proposition to tie up the chorus of these theorists rings true and clear; but when il comes to suggest some reasonable sensible plan of unlocking, all she parrots in the world could not make more discordant uproar.
 Six years may not seem very lona to some unfortunate possessor of in herited wealth riding hobby for his be far above state and territorial leg islatures, and for practical purposes above the power of Congress itself These bureaucrats were to exercise despotic control. depriving the people of their landed heritage and placing on their necks the iron collar of serf dom.
 Human nature does not change