6o 



AMERICAN FORESTRY 



"2. That Ballinger's railroad and mining 

 connections are intricate and extremely in 

 need of explanation. Instead of represent- 

 ing one client, and that slightly, as the Presi- 

 dent was induced to say, his relations to 

 such business were well-nigh numberless. He 

 had almost a monopoly of Seattle law where 

 political favors were essential. 



"3. That Senator Heyburn, Commissioner 

 Dennett, and other officials are deep in trouble 

 along with Ballinger. This trouble is not 

 merely moral. It looks very much as if 

 some of them had crossed the line of legal 

 danger. 



"4. That there is good reason for Cabinet 

 and Senators to urge President Taft to do 

 all he can to smother evidence, one of the 

 reasons being that Ballinger tried to stop 

 Glavis' investigations at one point in order to 

 help Mr. Taft's election. The claimants 

 would not help contribute to Mr. Taft's 

 campaign fund unless the investigations were 

 stopped. 



"This contrib.ution is not all. Much is 

 still kept back for reasons that are sufficient. 

 This instalment will be enough to show how 

 much the administration is undertaking when 

 it makes itself responsible for Ballinger, and 

 tries to hide behind either a thick coat of 

 whitewash or a sweet-sounding annual re- 

 port. Probably Mr. Taft will say, with 

 Dryden : 



" 'Now let the bold conspirator beware.' 



"It is only a few days since he issued an 

 executive order, the result of which is that 

 no member of the Interior Department can 

 testify before Congress without the express 

 approval of Mr. Ballinger. This joke be- 

 comes the more diverting when it is known 

 that the Secretary is performing quiet bits of 

 legerdemain in his department, now, at the 

 very moment when he is filling the earth with 

 virtuous noises." 



«? ^ »^ 



Billions of Treasure 



In McClure's for January appears an ar- 

 ticle under the above title by Messrs. John 

 E. Lathrop and George Kibbe Turner. 



This treasure is the enormous coal de- 

 posit of Alaska, conservatively estimatedto 

 be worth at least one and one-half billion 

 dollars. The story shows how the syndi- 

 cates, politicians, and grabbers generally have 

 for years been endeavoring, without authority 

 of law, to obtain possession. In the spring 

 of 1904, these coal hunters "'went after 

 Alaskan legislation" and got it. "From this 

 time oh the Cunningham group took the lead, 

 naturally. They were millionaires, captains 

 of industry, and men of large political influ- 

 ence. They broke the way for the other 

 groups, financially and politically. 



"The general business management of this 

 syndicate was in the hands of its pro- 

 moter, Clarence Cunningham. He kept a 

 ledger, cashbook, and a careful and detailed 

 iournal of its accounts. In the journal, un- 



der date of September 19, 1903, this mem- 

 orandum appears : 



" 'Have agreed with Mr. W. B. Heyburn 

 in consideration for his services as attorney 

 to carry him for one claim of 160 acres in 

 the coal, free of cost to him, and he agrees 

 to do all our legal work in procuring titles, 

 etc., free of expense to us.' " 



Senator Heyburn's fee, the writer esti- 

 mates, "would have a value of one and one- 

 half million dollars in commercial coal. * * * 



"In September, 1903, Mr. Heyburn was a 

 United States Senator, having been elected 

 by the Idaho legislature eight months be- 

 fore." 



In the spring of 1904 Mr. Heyburn se- 

 cured the passage of the Alaska Coal Land 

 Bill of April 28. "This broke the circle in 

 which the law of 1900 had placed the Gov- 

 ernment's coal in that district, and allowed it 

 to be taken over by persons who had sur- 

 veyed it at their own expense." 



Suddenly, the Government turned its at- 

 tention to land frauds in the Northwest and 

 "toward the end of 1904 John H. Mitchell, 

 of Oregon, was indicted for being a party 

 to these frauds while a Senator of the United 

 States." Senator Mitchell was sentenced to 

 prison. On October 20, 1905, Senator Hey- 

 burn wrote a letter to Cunningham declaring 

 four different times in four different ways, 

 "I do not desire to participate in, or be 

 interested in any manner, directly or indi- 

 rectly, in acquiring public lands." 



"This letter was written two years and 

 one month after the record in Clarence Cun- 

 ningham's journal of Mr. Heyburn's employ- 

 ment." 



Later the Guggenheims appear as the 

 leaders in Alaskan exploitation. Seattle, the 

 headquarters for all things Alaskan, fur- 

 nished the Land Office, Richard A. Ballinger 

 becoming Land Commissioner, Fred Dennett, 

 of the same city, being his assistant, and hh 

 nephew. "Jack" Ballinger, his confidential 

 secretary. 



Then follows the story of Ballinger's con- 

 nection with Alaskan coal lands, and Glavis's 

 attempt to save these lands from the syndi- 

 cnte, the whole being full, detailed, and spe- 

 cific. 



The Glavis letter, the Collier's story of De- 

 cember 18, and the McClure's story of Jan- 

 nary, are matters which the coming investi- 

 gating committee will be expected to prolie 

 to the bottom. 



5^' «r' Mi 



Coming Out into the Open 



"The West will not consent to a policy of 

 administration that would sell or rent water- 

 powcrs for the benefit of the 'whole people.' 

 Water-powers in New England are not so 

 'conserved.' Then why in Oregon? * * * 

 Just to satisfy a hazy demand in the East 

 for 'conservation.'" — 'Portland Oref^oniav on 

 conservation. 



"The water runs down our mountains, and 

 most of it flows idlv to the sea without turn- 



