450 



FORESTRY AND IRRIGATION 



October 



right of way for a transcontinental 

 railroad, which is now in course of 

 construction across the forest reserve 

 and across many of the locations. The 

 controlling locator was connected with 

 the railroad when the locations were 

 made and assigned the right of way 

 to it. When the construction of this 

 railroad is completed there will be a 

 public demand for the matured timber. 



Another man claims approximately 

 20,000 acres of land in the reserve un- 

 der mining locations made in similar 

 manner, and for the apparent purpose 

 of enabling him to monopolize the 

 most desirable and valuable water 

 power. 



Following its policy to make the 

 forest reserves contribute to the de- 

 velopment of the sections of country 

 in which they are located and to sup- 

 ply the sectional timber demand, and 

 to prevent monopoly of the resources 

 of the forest reserves, the Forest Ser- 

 vice found it necessary to take steps to 

 annul such locations as are clearly il- 

 legal. In a mineralized section, as 

 parts of the Plumas Forest Reserve 

 undoubtedly are, injustice and harm 

 to actual miners and actual mining 

 development can be avoided only by 

 the most conservative action. 



At the request of the Forester, the 

 Secretary of Agriculture laid the sit- 

 uation in the Plumas Forest Reserve 

 before the Secretary of the Interior. 

 The latter has determined that his De- 

 partment has legal power to determine 

 the validity of a location before the lo- 

 cator files application for patent in the 

 land department. A corps of geolo- 

 gists has been detailed by the Secre- 

 tary of the Interior to examine the 

 ground embraced in the locations to 

 determine whether or not a proper dis- 

 covery had been made and whether 

 or not the requisite amount of devel- 

 opment is being done. The evidence 

 gathered by these geologists will be 

 made the basis of a hearing before the 

 land department, and any locations 

 found illegal will be declared invalid. 

 It is to the interest of legitimate pros- 

 pectors and miners to support the ef- 

 forts of the Government to prevent 



one person or set of persons from ap- 

 propriating vast quantities of land un- 

 der pretended color but really in de- 

 'fiance of the mineral-land laws. The 

 resources of the forest reserve are 

 open at all times to persons actually 

 prospecting or developing mines, and 

 forest officers are instructed to encour- 

 age, assist, and protect actual mining. 

 Wholesale and illegal mining loca- 

 tions not only cloud the title of the 

 Government and prevent the public 

 sale of matured timber from forest re- 

 serves, but they encourage monopoly 

 of resources which could be most nat- 

 urally and beneficially developed by 

 varied interests. These locations also 

 retard legitimate mineral develop- 

 ment, since they make it necessary for 

 legitimate miners, desiring to locate 

 and actually develop any of this land, 

 to prosecute extensive contests against 

 illegal claimants. By illegal locations 

 which have not been regularly brought 

 before the Department of the Interior, 

 legitimate development and use of the 

 public land is discouraged. Stock 

 companies, based upon fraudulent 

 mineral land locations, are formed and 

 stock sold to innocent persons, who 

 are unaware of its illegal basis. The 

 situation of the Plumas Forest Re- 

 serve is duplicated upon surveyed, and 

 especially upon unsurveyed, public 

 land not in forest reserves, and the ac- 

 tion which is being taken in that re- 

 serve will be followed by similar ac- 

 tion in others, and legitimate claim- 

 ants to unreserved public land also 

 may hope to secure the annulment of 

 illegal mining claims for such land, 

 and its subjection to a proper and le- 

 gal use. The mineral-land laws un- 

 doubtedly have certain defects and 

 were enacted under conditions which 

 have changed, or to some extent dis- 

 appeared, but they were always in- 

 tended to foster legitimate mining de- 

 velopments, and to provide for perfec- 

 tion of title under legal discovery only. 

 As has been found with others of the 

 public land laws, the executive officers 

 have been given ample opportunity to 

 detect and prevent fraudulent and il- 

 legal acquisition of public lands. A 



