CONTRIBUTED ARTICLES 



oOo 



Forest Officers' Attitude on liining Claims 



37 

 W. A. Uerrill 



In National Forest administrative work Claims 

 occupy e prominent place and on sone of the forests, par- 

 ticularly on the Tahoe, the major portion of this work has 

 ts do rith mineral claims. Perhaps there is no branch of 

 the Service where the method of procedure is so little un- 

 derstood by the public or those directly Interested in the 

 mining industry. 



Almost without exception people desirous of se- 

 curing patents to their locations rithin a National Forest 

 are of the opinion that, since the land has beon r 'ithdrawn 

 from on try and pieced under the Jurisdiction of the Io,>c.rt- 

 ment of Agriculture, nor? laws have been enacted and that the* 

 miner has boon hodred about with restrictions calculated to 

 prevent him from securing title to his mining property. 



The general cry of miners and prospectors is apt 

 to be that, since the locality nhere they live haa been put 

 in the national ?orest and nev laws passed, the miner stands 

 a mirhty poor chance. It is In vain that the Forest Officer 

 erplair.s that no now laws exist and a prospector or miner has 

 all the ri -hts he ever poseeeeed, and the only difference 

 there can possibly be is the enforcement of the law as it 

 eristod heretofore. 



One of the ^roetest difficulties that a 

 officer has to contend "with is the seeming impossibility of 

 the avorc-re individual to correctly understand and repeat 

 facts as they are told. 



This has been brought to my notice many times. 

 For instance, after painstakingly explaining to an inquirer 

 his privele^es until I was sctlsfied that it was as clear as 



