564 Presidential Addresses 



has shown the locality where all the conditions com- 

 bine to make the work most needed and fraught 

 with the greatest usefulness to the community as a 

 whole. There should be no extravagance, and the 

 believers in the need of irrigation will most benefit 

 their cause by seeing to it that it is free from the 

 least taint of excessive or reckless expenditure of 

 the public moneys. 



Whatever the Nation does for the extension of 

 irrigation should harmonize with, and tend to im- 

 prove, the condition of those now living on irrigated 

 land. We are not at the starting point of this de- 

 velopment. Over two hundred millions of private 

 capital has already been expended in the construc- 

 tion of irrigation works, and many million acres of 

 arid land reclaimed. A high degree of enterprise 

 and ability has been shown in the work itself; but 

 as much can not be said in reference to the laws 

 relating thereto. The security and value of the 

 homes created depend largely on the stability of 

 titles to water; but the majority of these rest on 

 the uncertain foundation of court decisions rendered 

 in ordinary suits at law. With a few creditable ex- 

 ceptions, the arid States have failed to provide for 

 the certain and just division of streams in times of 

 scarcity. Lax and uncertain laws have made it pos- 

 sible to establish rights to water in excess of actual 

 uses or necessities, and many streams have already 

 passed into private ownership, or a control equiva- 

 lent to ownership. 



Whoever controls a stream practically controls the 



