Jdmes Wilson, Secretary of Agriculture 



THE NATIONAL IRRIGATION SITUATION 



By FREDERICK HAYNES NEWELL, Director of the 

 United States Reclamation Service* 



THE present situation in national 

 irrigation is that homes are being 

 provided for thousands of self- 

 supporting citizens at no cost to the 

 taxpayer. Seven years have elapsed 

 since the passage of the Reclamation 

 Act. Under its operation irrigation 

 works have been built in thirteen 

 western states and two territories by 

 which waters are conserved and dis- 

 tributed and nearly 700,000 acres al- 

 ready brought under irrigation, with 

 returns to the fund amounting already 



to over $1,000,000. The success ob- 

 tained may be said to justify the hopes 

 of the most enthusiastic of the early 

 advocates of the Reclamation Act. 



The law signed by President Roose- 

 velt on June 17, 1902, known as the 

 Reclamation Act, is, perhaps, the most 

 prominent of the statutes dealing di- 

 rectly with the conservation of natural 

 resources and with the utilization of 

 these in creating opportunities for a 

 a large body of citizens to own land in 

 small quantities sufficient for the sup- 



*Delivered before the National Irrigation Congress at Spokane. A\'ash., on August 9, 1909. 



527 



