THE USE BOOK. 267 



effective, Congress passed the act of June 4, 1897 (30 Stats., 

 35), whereby it vested in the Secretary of the Interior the 

 power to " make such rules and regulations and establish such 

 service as will insure the objects of such reservations, namely, 

 to regulate their occupancy and use and to preserve the forests 

 thereon from destruction." It was intended that this statute 

 should be effective, and accomplish the results for which it 

 was enacted. In pursuance of that authority, the Secretary of 

 the Interior has promulgated rules regulating the number of 

 cattle and other live stock that may pasture on the reservation, 

 and the manner in which the owners thereof may obtain per- 

 mission to use the reservation for that purpose. There can be 

 no doubt that the rules are reasonable and are within the 

 power so granted. In Dastervignes v. United States (122 Fed., 

 :(>, :>4) this court said: "Rule 13, promulgated by the Secretary 

 of the interior, is in accord with the provisions of the act of 

 Congress, and in our opinion was a valid and legitimate ex- 

 ercise of the authority delegated to him to make such rules 

 and regulations as would insure the objects of such reservations. 

 The Secretary, in adopting this rule, acted simply as the arm 

 that carries out the legislative will. He did not invade any 

 of the functions of Congress. He did not make any law, but 

 he exercised the authority given to him, and made rules to 

 preserve the forests on the reserves from destruction. Such 

 rules, within constitutional limits, have the force and effect of 

 law, and it is the duty of courts to protect and enforce them, 

 in order to uphold the law as enacted by Congress." 



But the appellant contends that he was not bound to maintain 

 a fence between his land and the Government reservation, nor 

 to keep the fence that was there in repair ; that he had the right 

 to destroy or remove a fence which was his own property, and 

 that it was for the appellee, if it desired to exclude live stock 

 from the reservation, to inclose the same, or to take the neces- 

 sary steps under the statutes of Montana to require adjacent 

 proprietors to join in a division fence, and cites statutes of that 

 State from which it appears that the legislature has in sub- 

 stance declared that cattle may run at large in Montana, and 

 that all owners who neglect to fence their lands against such 

 stock shall be without remedy against the owners of animals 

 which may trespass thereon, and argues that those laws are 

 binding upon the United States as a landowner to the same ex- 

 tent that they are binding upon the owners of other lands situ- 

 ated within the State, and that the Government, although in 

 some positions and under certain defined conditions is a sov- 

 ereign, it is, nevertheless, in the situation here presented, a mere 

 private landowner, having the same rights, and no others, which 

 are enjoyed by other landowners. 



