Iditarod pioneer., 1914-10-10
COAL-LEASING MEASURE
 WHICH MAY BECOME LAW
(Ashmun Brown, in Seattle Post 1ntelli-
 ppncer)

 provisions, threats of the peniten tiary and of forfeiture, the Ferris Alaska coal land leasing bill passed the house on September and is now before the senate. It is probable that the senate committee on public lands will substitute a bill of it's own for the house bill, pass that with prob ably some amendments to be offered on the floor and that the actual law will be made in conference This, by the way, is the manner in which many important laws have been made
 The senate bill which in all probability will be offered as a substitute for the house bill is that which was presented m the sen ate on February last by Senator Walsh of Montana, and referred to the committee cn mines, of which MT. Walsh is chairman. But Senator Shoot of Utah was not content to let it rest there, and, due to his actlvl- ties, the bill was taken from Senator Walshs committee and referred to the com mittee on public lands, of which Senator Myers, also of Montana, IS chairman. MT Myers reported the bill out on March 25.
 Both bills have a common origin ln the department of the interior. However, the house or Ferris bill, in committee was loaded up with penalty provisions which, in the opinion of men who have made study of the situation, makes it absolutely rn- workable Moreover the Ferris bill dlsre- gards entirely the rights of existing valid claimants to Alaska coal lands It would ",ine them off the map, althouch all ot them have paid their money to the United States treasury at the rate of SlO an acre for the lands they claim, to an aggregate sum of more than S300000
 The senate bill. which is really the i'm portant one now to be talked about, pro vides that the secretary of the interior shall classify the coal lands of Alaska, partlcu- larlv those of the Boring and Matanuska fields, and survey them in blocks of forty acres and multiples thereof up to 2,5GO acres. then to offer these blocks or combna- ticns of blocks for lease, a person or cor poration to be interested only in one lease. Any lessee is prohibited from acquiring or holding any interest, directly or indirectly, in another lease and violation of thls pro vision is punished by forfeiture and by fine and Imprisonment. Stock m a cor Doration hclding lease IS considered an m tercst in a lease.
 Lessees may consolidate their leases, with the approval of the secretary of the in terior. if the consolidated area does not ex- ceed 2,560 acres
 Leases arc to be for not more than fifty years Royalties are placed at not less than } cents Ter more than , cents per ton In addition, the lessee is required to pay an annual rental of ? cents an acre for the second, third, fourth and fifth years and Sl an acre for each year thereafter, the rental to be credited against the royalty
 The secretary of the interior is author ized to grant limited licenses to mine coal for strictly local CT domestic purposes with out the payment of royalty. Such license is limited to ten acres and rerod ct ten years.
 Five thousand one hundred and twenty acres in the Berng and 16S0 acres Tn the Matanuska areas are reserved to the gov ernment This is considered to be one third Of the available coal in each dlstrct
 All of these provisions are contained Tn the house CT Ferris bill, also, but tie house bill adds Q let and deoorates the structure with series of penal provision friliS.
 But one very important difference Is that the senate, CT Wal,h bill, attempts to do some measure of justice to the legitimate coal claimants, while the Ferris bill wouI3 wipe them out.
 Section 3 of the senate bill provides that leases shall be let Subject to any prior existing rights. which said rights may be perfected under the laws in force at the time the same were initiated
 ''It is not the intention of the committee to deprive anyone of his valid existing rights by legislative enactment says the senate report Existing rights must be de termined by the proper tribunals
 The senate bill further provides that any person who is the owner of claim may surrender the same to the United States and thereupon have prior right to lease on such tract.
 As opposed to this, the Ferris bill, as passed by the house, emphatlcalIy struck out a provision in the original draft pro viding that leases should be subject to any prior or valid existing rights Fur ther the Ferris bill contains this provlslon' calculated to destroy whatever rights prlor claimant might have:
 "The possession of any lessee of the land or coal deposits leased under this act for all purposes involving adverse claims to the leased property, shall be deemed the pos session cf the United States, and for such purposes the lessee shall occupy the same relation to the property leased as if oper- ated directly by the United States"
 To apply this to a concrete base: The claimants to the Mcdonald group in the Boring area years ago paid to the govern ment the purchase price of SlO an acre for their land and received final receipts there for Then they expended about sl75,O0 in development work Their machinery is still there, rusting. They cannot get back their SlO an acre and they cannot operate the property.
 Under the Ferris bill this would be the most valuable lease that might be granted. The government could lease the property, machinery included, to an outside bidder and the men who paid Uncle Sam his ask ing price for the land, and who thereafter invested S175,000 in development work would be on the outside looking in. By the terms quoted above they would be ex- pressly stopped from going into a court Of law to secure an adjustment, for one may not sue the United States without the ex- press consent of congress.
 But the senate bill makes express pro