THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



adidtional land was increasing rapidly the field of irri- 

 gation industry began to present inviting opportunities 

 for the investment of capital. 



Under these circumstances it was not a difficult 

 matter for adroit promoters to figure out with a pencil 

 and a piece of paper very attractive and alluring invest- 

 ments in irrigation projects. 



Many investors were induced to embark hastily in 

 doubtful and ill-considered projects after a most casual 

 and indifferent investigation, only to discover later that 

 their investments had no basis of security whatever. 



A popular illusion, and the one that probably was 

 the source of more failures in the field of irrigation in- 

 vestment than any other, was the belief that an irriga- 

 tion project supplying water to the owners of the under- 

 lying lands for hire or for an annual rental at so much 

 per unit could be made profitable. 



Other investors were deluded in the belief that a 

 ditch constructed to cover and supply an area or district 

 of unoccupied public domain, and depending upon sub- 

 sequent occupation and settlement could be made prof- 

 itable. 



The fallacy in the proposition first mentioned lies 

 in the divided control and ownership of the land and 

 water, and I will reiterate the statement for the sake of 

 emphasizing it, that no irrigation scheme can be made 

 a success where the ownership of the land and the ditch 

 are in separate hands. 



The source of failure in the second case mentioned, 

 even where the scheme contemplated the sale of the 

 ditch to the water users by pro-rating the shares of stock 

 to the acreage supplied, arose from the fact that the 

 expenses accruing from the interest charges and the 

 cost of operation and maintenance before an income was 

 realized became too great to be borne by the projectors 

 without some basis of credit or security and without 

 some assurance of ultimate reimbursement. 



There were enough of these failures to give rise to 

 the very prevalent opinion that most if not all "private 

 enterprise" irrigation schemes were failures, and this 

 assertion is often made generally for sinister reasons. 



There was another class of investors, however, that 

 entered the field and made a more careful and thorough 

 investigation of the underlying principles of invest- 

 ment and security as related to irrigation projects, and 

 who discovered that in a properly designed enterprise 

 and where the land and a conjointly related water right 

 was made the basis of credit there was ample security 

 for whatever investment became necessary to accomplish 

 the reclamation. It was found that the increment in 

 the values created obtained with the reclaimed land and 

 that the detached water-right represented by the carry- 

 ing capacity of the ditch had no inherent value, or at 

 least no value sufficiently staple and abiding to furnish 

 adequate security for the investment required. The 

 fundamental step with this class of investors was to 

 secure the title to or at least a guaranteed control of a 

 sufficient area of land to justify the expenditure required 

 in the undertaking, and it was generally found that 

 there was a sufficient area of additional land to be re- 

 claimed to make the investment an exceedingly profit- 

 able one. A careful examination of the records of irri- 

 gation investment will disclose a distinct line of demar- 

 cation between these two classes of enterprises. In that 

 class based on speculation in the delivery of water to 

 the land owners perhaps 90 per cent of the undertakings 

 have been financial failures. The other ten per cent 



being redeemed by advantageous circumstances or by 

 conditions so exceedingly favorable that they were profit- 

 able in spite of their mistaken conception. As to the 

 other class, where the investment was secured by the 

 reclaimed and irrigated land, it was entirely safe to 'say 

 that not a case of financial failure can be cited, and 

 while this fact came to be generally recognized in 

 course of time, investment in irrigation enterprises 

 began to wane for the lack of suitable opportunities. 



It was difficult to find a location where bodies of 

 land of sufficient area suitable for reclamation the title 

 or control of which could be secured as a foundation 

 for such an enterprise. It was probably the recognition 

 of this difficulty that inspired the passage of that con- 

 gressional enactment now generally known as the 

 "Carey Act," but which was first decreed under the title 

 of "An Act to Provide for the Sale of Desert Land in 

 Certain States and Territories," approved March 3d, 

 1877, and subsequently modified by amendments passed 

 in 1894 and in 1897, which constitutes the law as it is 

 now in force and operation. 



Briefly stated this law provides for the cession or 

 grant to certain States, in which there may be situated 

 desert lands, one million acres of such desert lands to 

 each State under certain conditions, the purport of 

 which is that the land is to be reclaimed and occupied 

 by settlers in tracts not to exceed 100 acres each and 

 such reclamation to be completed within ten years 

 from the date of entry. The gist of the law, however, 

 is that provision whereby a lien is authorized to be 

 created by the State to which such lands are granted 

 against all the lands reclaimed for the cost of such 

 reclamation together with a reasonable interest thereon 

 until the State, or its agent, shall have been reim- 

 bursed. This provision enables the State to offer the 

 investor a substantial and satisfactory security for the 

 money required in the construction of the necessary irri- 

 gation works. When the State shall have submitted 

 satisfactory proof that the land has been occupied in 

 good faith and that a sufficient supply of water has 

 been furnished to reclaim the same, the Secretary of the 

 Interior shall then issued to the State a patent for 

 the land, which in turn is issued to the settler upon 

 the payment of 50 cents per acre, which money goes to 

 the State as a trust fund to be applied to the reclama- 

 tion of other desert lands. When this law was passed 

 few, if any, of the States to which it was applicable 

 were in position to avail themselves of its benefits. 



To carry into effect the terms of the law required 

 much new State legislation and the creation of the 

 necessary- administrative machinery and a number of 

 years elapsed before the real import and the benefits 

 of the law came to be generally recognized and under- 

 stood, and it is only within the last few years that the 

 stamp of popular approval has been placed upon this 

 act of propitious legislation. 



Those most familiar with its practical operation, 

 and who have had the best opportunity to study its 

 scope and field of usefulness are its most enthusiastic 

 advocates and predict that in the end the development 

 of the State will be better promoted and the interests 

 of the communities concerned better conserved through 

 the agency of the Carey Act than through the National 

 Reclamation Act. 



Without effort or expense the national government 

 passes over its desert land to the settler with all possi- 



