406 



THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



The main intent of the reclamation act in bringing about 

 beneficial results to the multitude frequently puts the indi- 

 vidual to annoyance and expense. The requirement of resi- 

 dence on the land, or in the neighborhood, is freely criticised 

 as Involving unnecessary hardship, and yet this is one ot the 

 requirements which the majority of Congress considered as 

 being an essential condition for the advancement of Federal 

 funds. 



The slowness of the work is also criticised and It has 

 come to be a matter of general remark that the Government is 

 always slow. This, like many truisms, is a statement which 

 does not stand close analysis. There are very few corpora- 

 tions which have accomplished with the funds available as 

 much as has been carried on by the Reclamation Service, 

 who forget that the rate of construction is limited by the 

 money available and that the original intent of the frameri; 

 of the act was that large works beyond the reach of private 

 enterprise should be laid out in a comprehensive manner 

 and that portions of these should be built as funds were 

 available, assuming that certain portions or units could be 

 completed well in advance of the demand for homes. This 

 anticipation, however, has not been realized. 



From the minute that a large project is outlined and 

 results laid before Congress in the annual reports there 

 comes an insistent demand that all parts be pushed forward 

 so as to let every man obtain water at the earliest possible 

 date. The people are impatient, as they are in a western 

 city, for all of the improvements to be carried on at once, 

 forgetting that revenues are not sufficient. It is as thougli 

 the settlers in a new town demand that water, light, sewerage, 

 gas and paved streets be built immediately, ignoring the 

 fact that the execution of plans must await the obtaining of 

 revenues and that because plans are made looking forward 

 to a great municipality, it must not be inferred that there 

 is money on hand to complete them at once. 



The successful handling of the reclamation fund prob- 

 ably requires as much, if not more, skill and patience than 

 in any industrial enterprise. On the one hand are the set- 

 tlers clamoring for immediate results; on the other hand are 

 engineering problems and complications of vested rights to 

 water and difficult rights of way, with detective land titles, 

 all of which must be patiently worked out under very exact- 

 ing regulations. The Federal employee is regarded by all 

 as a proper target, when joined with this is the fact that 

 the man in control of the ditch is as a matter of course re- 

 garded by everyone as responsible for every evil in the com- 

 munity and you have a combination which requires almost 

 unlimited skill, tact and self-control. 



The reclamation act Is not a perfect document, but, like 

 most acts of Congress, is the result of compromise of many 

 conflicting ideas. It is purposely very broad and leaves as 

 many details as possible to executive discretion. Wherever 

 it may be defective, these defects can only be remedied in 

 one way, namely by Congress and not by any official. It is 

 worse than uselss, therefore, to attempt to remedy these 

 defects, if they exist, through criticism of the methods 

 adopted by the officials in direct charge. Any needed im- 

 provements should be brought to the attention of the law- 

 making body and particularly to the committees on irrigation 

 of the Senate and House, each of which is seeking for sug- 

 gestions and intelligent advice from practical men. 



I might add in conclusion that the Senate Committee has 

 now started on its general trip throughout the West and that 

 they will be in Montana during this week and next. I regret 

 that I cannot stay during the deliberations of this body, but 

 must go east to meet the Senate Committee. I hope when 

 that committee visits the localities in which each of you ar* 

 interested you will call to their attention anything which 

 may be needed in the way of additional legislation or of im- 

 provements which may be made in the Act; remembering, 

 however, that one of the dangers of attempting to amend a 

 general law is that you do not know where those amendments 

 will cease, and that to secure the desired result in one way, 

 may result perhaps in overturning some things which you 

 regard as very valuable. I thank you, gentlemen, for your 

 attention. 



Discussion of Mr. Newell's address follows: 



Mr. Fairweather: I hear it very frequently, Mr. 

 Newell, that the lands are not being taken up as fast as 

 they should be. How is it? 



Mr. Newell: I am very glad to answer that ques- 

 tion as to the rate at which land is being taken up. In 

 fact, I would like to do a little advertising of the land. 

 On two or three of our projects we have some land which 

 is available to each of you, and we would be very glad 

 to have you take it. For 'instance, if you would go to 

 Montana, to the Huntley project, where we have about 

 200 farms, and where the rate of settlement is three or 

 four or five families a week, there are excellent oppor- 

 tunities, and I think the rate at which they are taking 

 those farms is about as rapid as the development can 

 proceed in the best way. In the same way in Northern 

 Wyoming, on the Shoshone Project, we have about 30,000 

 acres under irrigation this year, and there are several 

 I believe a hundred farms or so there. But outside of 

 the Huntley Project in Montana, and the Shoshone in 

 Wyoming, and possibly the Truckee-Carson in Nevada, 

 the demand has already exhausted the supply, and there 

 is no more free government land. 



Mr. Boyd, of California: I would like to ask if those 

 lands that are being irrigated under the government sys- 



tem are available to those who have exhausted their 

 privilege of taking homesteads. I do not think the public 

 is clear on that point. 



Mr. Newell: I am very sorry to say that they are 

 open only under the Homestead Act, so that they can 

 only be taken by men who have not exhausted their 

 homestead right. 



Mr. Fairweather: If I understand you, the land is 

 actually being taken up about as fast as you think it 

 ought to be? 



Nr. Newell: I think so. I do not think this rapid 

 taking up of land always leads to the best results. Men 

 sometimes take lands that they really do not want, when 

 they can get them. 



Mr. Fairweather: I understand that the money is 

 not to be paid in according to the contract. Are specu- 

 lators or anybody trying to get land without the work 

 being done on the land? 



Mr. Newell: I think not. I think they are gen- 

 erally taking these up as bona tide homesteaders, who 

 desire to maintain a home. They have already paid back 

 about a million dollars, and several million dollars is 

 due or will be due in December of this year. Now, like 

 many other classes, the farmer has so many needs for 

 his money that he is not inclined always to pay for his 

 water until he has to, so that many of them wait until 

 the last moment, until they are liable to forfeit their 

 rights, before they make their payments. But, I believe 

 they will practically all come up and make their pay- 

 ments. The speculative item has come up very largely 

 by the fact that a man cannot live on his land, but must 

 pay back his water right rapidly, as, of course, he is 

 forced to by the working of the act; 



Mr. Fairweather: You say there is money due the 

 government that has not been paid in? 



Mr. Newell: Yes. 



Mr. Fairweather: Are the people that are now pay- 

 ing in, holding that land with the idea of selling it to 

 some one else at a higher price? 



Mr. Newell: It is hard to say what their motives 

 may be, although, I thing most of them intend to culti- 

 vate the land. You know that under the Homestead Act, 

 if it becomes known that a man is holding a homestead 

 with the desire to sell it, the land office may cancel nis 

 entry, so that a man who really wants to sell hardly 

 dares to say so for fear the land office will say, "You 

 are not a bona fide homesteader." So a good many of 

 them are holding, and I think at good advantage to them- 

 selves. But I should hardly say that they were specu- 

 lators as the term is generally, known. 



Mr. Fairweather: Just one more question. Do you 

 consider that the residence requirement of the act in 

 the law works a hardship on the people? Would you 

 suggest an amendment of the law? 



Mr. Newell: That is a question which I should be 

 very, glad to have others express an opinion upon. Per- 

 sonally, I believe the homestead requirement is very 

 necessary and desirable. But it does work a hardship, 

 especially where men take up land before the irrigation 

 system is completed. Under the act it has been possible 

 for men to go in and take up homesteads as fast as we 

 make the surveys, and if they are down at the end of a 

 long system they may wait two, three, four and five years 

 for their water, and to those men it is a genuine hard- 

 ship to be called upon to stay there. Sometimes as soon 

 as they see the surveyor there they go in, and it is a 

 hardship that they must have to say. Nevertheless, the 

 result on the whole is good, and I think, as I believe a 

 majority of the congress do. that it does result in the 

 actual settlement of the land. To illustrate your point, 

 it has been asserted to me, and I would be very glad to 

 have it corrected if I am in error, that in our Shoshone 

 project in Wyoming with, I think, 13,000 acres under 

 irrigation this year, we have more actual residents living 

 on the land and cultivating it than there are in all the 

 other Carey projects in the state. If I am not correct, 

 I want to be corrected. But, I think that that 13,000 

 acres has more people living on it, more citizens of 

 Wyoming, than the 250,000 acres that has been disposed 

 of under the Carey act. 



Mr. Fairweather: If I understand the law, while the 

 people are living there, they are not required to pay any- 



