352 Proceedings of the 



ment all citizens may take another lesson from the 

 Government's attitude to the public forest lands, and 

 just as the general people's valuable forest assets are 

 being set apart for careful husbandry in forest reserves, 

 so the citizens may well insist that our public mineral 

 lands have ceased to serve a useful purpose as a bait to 

 immigration. It is no longer necessary nor good public 

 policy for the Government to give away practically free 

 to the mine promoter valuable coal, oil, gas lands, and 

 also lands where valuable metalliferous deposits may 

 be reasonably looked for. 



The prospector is no longer greatly aided by such 

 laws. He can be helped much more by governmental 

 cooperation and joint ownership. It seems timely that 

 the same wise regulations adopted for the sale and 

 lease of lands belonging to the Indians should be ap- 

 plied to lands belonging to the people as a whole, and 

 it is to be hoped that Death Valley, many regions in 

 eastern Utah, in the Rocky Mountain regions, may 

 soon become Government mineral reserves. 



