The Alaska daily empire., 1921-04-08
FOR MINING LAW IS
 BEING PLANNED
Cochran Introduces Bill to Repeal Requirement for
 Affidavit of Labor.


 To correct defect in the exist ing Territorial mining laws and repeal section which was declared by the U. s. Circuit of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in decision rem hered few months ago to be un- constitutional. Representative o. D. Cochran, of Nome, this morning in
 troduced a bill providing for the amendment of Chapter 10, Session Laws of 1915. It seeks to repeal the clause declaring failure of own CTS of mining claims to record an nual assessment , work within 90 days after the close of the year opens the claim to relocation and also a clause crediting the cost or survey to assessment work.
 The first clause was the point at issue in case appealed from the Nome District Court, Judge COch ran being attorney for appellant. Judge Gilbert, of the Court of Ap- peals stated the decision which was unanimous and recited the main facts in evidence as follows: The court below entered decree quiet ing the appellee's title to a certain placer mining claim The claim was originally located on July 4, 1914, and from that time on until the re- location of the claim by appelleeS on April l, 1917, the annual assess ment work was duly performed. The assessment work for 1916 had been duly performed by the appellants, but they had failed to file within 90 days from the close of that year the affidavit required by Section :, Chapter 10 of the 1915 Session Laws of the Territory of Alaska, which requires in substance that in order to hold claim after the an nual assessment work has been done, an affidavit containing ceri tain specified statements must be- filed with the recorder of the dis trict not later than 90 days after the close of the calendar year, and further provides that failure to tileI the same shall be deemed an aband- Cnment of the location and the claim shall be subject to relocation by any other person; provided, that a compliance with the provisions or this section before any relocation shall operate to save the rights of. the original locator"
 The Circuit Court held The Act of the Territorial Legislature Of 1915 is in conflict with the general law of the United States which gives the owner of a located mining claim the right to hold and occupy the requisite annual assessment work thereon,i adding that Con gress reaffirmed that law as ap-I plicable to Alaska by the Act of 1907 adding provisions for filing affidavits as prima facie evidence of the performance of the assess ment work but making provision for forfeiture only upon failure to perform the work.
 The Court concluded: The Act of the Alaskan Legislature set that provision aside, and declared that performance of the work shall not be sufficient, that forfeiture shall follow the failure to file an affida- wit. To legislate thus was to tran scend the authority conferred by the Enabling Act, was to interfere with the right of Congress to dis pose of the public domain, was to destroy an estate which Congress grants in public lands, and was to exercise d power which Congress never intended to delegate, the power to declare the forfeiture of mining claims.