882 ANNUAL REPORTS OF DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



construction and operation of the railroad. After the road was con- 

 structed the company refused to execute the stipulation. During 

 the course of construction the company cut and used lar^e quantities 

 of timber and cast into the St. Joe River quantities of stone and 

 debris, thus obstructing the navigability of the stream and lessening 

 the value of the timber on forest lands. The bill also prayed damages 

 for the injuries caused by the cutting of the timber and the obstruc- 

 tion to the river. The company demurred to the bill. The demurrer 

 was overruled on February 12, 1910, the court holding that the 

 Secretary had the power and authority to require the stipulations. 

 (See Circular No. 32, Office of the Solicitor.) The case was pending 

 on answer to the amended bill at the close of the year. 



Several indictments were returned during the year against persons 

 who were conducting saloons on the National Forests in violation of 

 the regulations for the protection of the Forests. Some of these 

 cases involve the much-mooted and, as yet, undetermined, question 

 of the right of a mineral locator to conduct a saloon on his claim, 

 despite the regulation of the Department prohibiting its maintenance 

 in a National Forest. Four of these cases in Idaho have been argued 

 and elaborate briefs filed by the United States and defendants, and 

 the court had them under consideration at the close of the year. 

 In these four cases the district law officer at Missoula, Mont., prac- 

 tically prepared and conducted the entire argument for the Govern- 

 ment. He secured the indictment against the defendants. The 

 issue in these cases is of vast importance to the successful adminis- 

 tration of the National Forests, and a decision thereon is awaited with 

 much interest both to the Department and the people living in and 

 adjacent to the Forests. 



Of great interest during the year was the action of the Supreme 

 Court in the cases of the United States v. Grimaud and Carajous, and 

 United States v. Inda, both arising in the southern district of Cali- 

 fornia upon indictments in the district court for grazing sheep on 

 the Sierra National Forest without permits from the Secretary, and 

 in violation of the regulations of the Department. The district 

 court sustained demurrers to the indictments on the ground that 

 the act of June 4, 1897, under the authority of which the regulations 

 were made and promulgated, was unconstitutional in so far as it 

 authorized the Secretary to make the regulations and imposed pen- 

 alties upon anyone violating them. It was held that the authority 

 to make these regulations was a delegation of legislative power and 

 unauthorized by the Constitution. The Government took a writ of 

 error direct to the Supreme Court, where, in March last, without 

 filing an opinion, the court affirmed the judgment of the district 

 court by an even division of the justices, the effect of which was a 

 disposition of those cases, but no binding authority in subsequent 

 cases of the same nature. The Solicitor-General petitioned for a 

 rehearing, so that the cases might be heard by the entire bench and 

 a final decision on the question rendered. On April 13 following 

 the court granted the prayer of the petition, and the cases will be 

 reargued during the coming fall. No case could arise of more far- 

 reaching importance than these, involving as they do the authority 

 of the Secretary to make prohibitive regulations for the protection 

 of the National Forests. 



