The gazette-times. [volume] (Heppner, Or.) 1912-1925, 1915-09-30
HOW THE EAST LOVES Us.

From the Atlantic to the eastern
base of the Rocky mountains the
settlers helped themselves, as they
advanced, to everything they could
find in the then wilderness. The ut
most they ever paid for the richest
lands was $3.50 per acre-just enough
to pay for the surveys and the max
ing out of the deeds.
Some three score years or more
ago some crank started the idea that
inasmuch as the government owned
the public domain, it in reality be-
longed to all the people and if it any
where contained special treasures
like lead or zine or coal or iron de-
posits, the whole people should own
these deposits. The idea seemed a
good one to the men in the far east,
who knew nothing of the frontier or
the hardships incident upon its set
tlement and redemption, and they
caused law to be passed to secure
to themselves their pro-rata of the
undiscovered or undeveloped wealth.
1t was tried for FIVE years and its
unproductiveness and its manifest in
justice caused congress to repeal the
law without one dissenting vote.
But few years ago the thought
was revived in the east and though
in the interval between the repeal of
the old law and the resurrection of
the old thought, the west, and most
ly the deserts Of the west, had sup
piled the means to the east to enable
it to make available its many re-
sources and grow rich, this revived
thought took a strong hold on eastern
cupidity, and the then President, one
Theordore Roosevelt, selected per-
sonal friend. one Clifford Pinchot, to
go west, spy out the land and see
what he could find and appropriate.
By the way, it is understood that Mr..
Pinchot, for his personal use draws
large annual revenues from coal
mines in Pennsylvania which origin
ally cost his ancestors only $3.50 per
acre.
In the meantime because of the
partial subduing of electricity to
mans use, water power had become
valuable. So had timber lands, so
had oil lands, so had iron and coal
lands.
Thus when Mr. Pinchot came west,
what he did was in effect to deliver
an ultimatum to the men of the
desert, which, set to words, was about
this:
"Our great and benefcent gov
ernment loves the men of the desert
almost as much as it does the lovable
mongrels in Mexico; it wants you all
to prosper and so opens the whole
of this domain to you, only keep in
mind that if you discover any for
ests, any streams that will make wa
ter power, any coal or iron mines or
oil lands, you must not disturb them
for they are on the public domain,
they may become valuable after
while and all the people of the east
have common interest in them and
must realize their pro rata of any
profits that may come from them"
Then he sent out a small army of
his friends on government salaries, as
spies to see that the greedy men of
the west should not appropriate any
thing in which his benevolent friends
in the east had their pro rata inter-
est. In this way about one-third of
the state of Idaho was placed under
a timber reserve, including the
streams that water power might be
created from. In the same way Utah
oil and coal and timber lands were
covered. In Alaska some nervy men
had begun to make some coal lands
available for the people, but the cry
went up that they were monopolists
and the government Immediately sat
down upon them, and so for five years
past, the general public up there has,
with ample coal measures at it's doors
been forced to buy coal from Japan
and British Columbia.
But it is idle to inveigh against the
mingled cupidity and stupidity of the
educated idiots who at long range
feel it duty to rob the west though
they know no more about the real
conditions than they know of the God
they pray for blessings from So
they continue to pray to God and to
prey upon the west.-Goodwin S
Weekly.