Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1915-12-19
LET NOTHING HALT
 DEVELOPMENT OF
 OUR OWN COUNTRY

| Washington, Dsc. 1S-A warning t. the United States not to permit the pressing need for national prepared | ness legislation of dramatic" sort | to retard the development of Cur own country was spoken today by Secretary of the Interior Franklin K
 Lane in his annual report to the president of she United States.
 'ln presenting an outlina of the years work l make bold to express the hope that no other policies of | this government may be allowed to stay the int. .rnal development Of this country" says Secretary Lane "There | is fear, how general I do not know
 that this government will halt in car rying out it's full and needed program of legislation aff fecting home affairs | because of the immediate need for streng 2hening our national defenses This apprehension arises, 1 am con- fident, out of no lack of sympathy with the plan to increase the army and the navy, but out of a feeling that the government in both execu- tive and legislative branches will be so immersed in matters military and naval as to overlook these matters of less dramatic and perhaps less imme- diate concern
 Secretary Lane says that the Deo- pie of the United States are fully justified in having boundless pride in their country and should not per init any influences to forestall it's de- veropmenf. Foreigners, he says. are inclined tc, comment facetiously on American pride, but, says MT. Lane, "instead of being the. petty boasting Of a parochial- minded province, this spirit is the very essence of the high est creative quality"
 Only 2SO,0OO,OOO Acres Left.
 MT. Lane calls the period of the de- velopment of the United States "The Era of Splendid Giving" because of the generous policy of the govern ment in giving to states, cities, schools. railroads. other enterprises and to the individuals land and other resources out of the. public store. People from the ends of the earth have been called TO our shores and given homes, he says. Out of an original acreage of billion and a | ilalf, the land has basn dispensed until but 2S0,000000 acres are left We expend a million and half a year through the geological survey to discover the potential waalth of these lands. says the-report.
 The government insists. as the only string to it's gift of broad acres, that the homestcads granted De put tc use. It wants Eolm emakers and home keepers, he says. Where it has seen abuses of the liberal land policy and attempts at the. formation of land water power or mineral. resources monopolies- it has reach saeto tont long arm and withdrawn Such territory in order to save it for workers: Waste of Oil Crime.
 The United States has an estimated natural supply of 23,OO0,C0O, 900 bar rels of petroleum but this is being used at the rate of 265.000,O00 bar rels year. To waste this resource | is a crime. says Secretary Lane, fer | petroleum now is used in almost every industry. many industries being l largely dependent upon it. No sub- sti.ute has been found, the repQr, says.
 In the matter of the oil lands with. drawn by executive order of lPres;- dent Taft, which order was validated | by action of the supreme court of the United States, Secretary Lane says that many of the claimants of lands now in litigation are justly entitled to them. For the government to de- prive men and companies who have
 invested hundreds of thousands c1
 dollars in these enterprises would be
 an injustice, he says. It would be
 unwise to exact all that even the law
 allows from the claimants, the report
 asserts.( The department of justice
 now is suing to dispossess certain
 Cil land claimants working fields
 withdrawn by executive order.)
 Indian Affairs.
 Recommendations of the commits.
 sioner of Indian affairs reported by
 Secretary Lane include: legislation
 for the disposition of 10000 acres
 Chcctaw and Chickasaw mineral i lands; for early per, capita distri.
 button of tribal money; for the set
 tlement of land disputes arising from
 uncertainty of the border between
 Texas and Oh ctaw and Chickasaw
 lands in Oklahona; for further ap.
 propriation of $275,O0O for common and tribal schools in Oklahoma; fol l Indian sanitation and disease pro
 vention work; for repeal of laws per
 hitting restricted Indians from
 leasing their lands without depart
 mental supervision; for securing tt
 the h.irs of restricted Indians tho
 lands they leave at death; for the ad
 ministration and execution of estates
 of Indians; for the repeal of legisla
 ton permitting 2 restricted Indian te
 make will allotting his restricted
 property; for payment of equalization ~sk dc to hoir