THE GRASS LANDS 159 



STATE SOLUTION OF RANGE PROBLEMS 



Montana attacked the range problem from the land owner" 

 ship angle. If you should draw a map of land ownership in any 

 typical range county, the result would be a patchwork quilt. 

 Here would be a small area owned by some out'of 'State cattle 

 corporation, or a lending agency that had taken over a local 

 cattle outfit. To the north of this piece would be a square of 

 railroad land. Next to that would be some public domain land 

 with possibly some state school land in the middle of it. Prob- 

 ably there would be nearby a National Forest through which 

 would be scattered little areas of private land, state land, rail" 

 road land. And everywhere would be sections of tax'delinquent 

 land. In this helter-skelter pattern of ownership the individual 

 livestock grower was caught in a maze of legal and bureaucratic 

 technicalities. Montana's solution was to authorize the stock 

 men to form grazing districts. The law making this possible 

 was passed in 1933 and amended in 1935. 



This is how a grazing district operates. Three or more land 

 users in an area sign a document called Articles of Incorpora- 

 tion and file it with Montana's Secretary of State. This dooi' 

 ment declares that the signers have formed a cooperative 

 grazing association for "the acquisition, control, conservation, 

 and beneficial use by its members of certain grazing lands lying 

 in ... County." They agree to buy or lease land adjacent to 

 the land they own so that they will control a solid block of 

 grazing land. Then the members by a majority vote elect a 

 board of directors and decide on a form of government for 

 their grazing district. 



These decisions must be approved by the Montana Grazing 

 Commission. The directors apportion the land among the mem 

 bers and determine how much stock they may graze on it. They 

 lay down rules of how this land is to be used. These rules must 

 be approved by the Montana Grazing Commission. In order 



