262 



THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



for Hooker to attend the recent Irrigation Confer- 

 ence at Denver. 



Surely these men, who sold the Congress, are 

 in a sad plight. 



It would be no more than fitting to let Hooker 

 and the Board of Governors continue to suffer hu- 

 miliation at the hands of the purchasers of the Con- 

 gress, if it did not mean peril for the Congress itself. 



But the Irrigation Congress should be saved. 

 It should not be prostituted to boom the lands of an 

 alien nation. It was organized to aid in the develop- 

 ment of the West of the United States. That is its 

 one great purpose and mission. 



If the Board of Governors and Secretary Hook- 

 er haven't enough red-blooded patriotism in their 

 veins to undo the deal which they have made they 

 should resign at once ; the executive committee of 

 the Congress should be called together and steps 

 taken to restore the Congress to American soil and 

 to the purposes for which it was originated and 

 built up. The sale of the Congress must be stopped. 



Better the Irrigation Congress die than be sold 

 into slavery to the Canadian land boomers. 



Louis W. Hill, president of the Great 

 Mr. Hill's Northern Railway, had just corn- 



Indictment pleted a trip over the vast system 

 of F. H. which he controls. He was accom- 



Newell panied by a party of men, prominent 



in many walks of life all of them 

 hard-headed business men, with the interests of the 

 West at heart. A Western town was banqueting 

 Mr. Hill. He was asked to speak. His mind was 

 filled with those things which he had just seen ; 

 with similar things which he had seen on many 

 other trips through the West. He cited the Willis- 

 ton pumping project in North Dakota, and the Fort 

 Peck and Milk River projects in Montana, all Fed- 

 eral government enterprises, and then he delivered 

 this stinging indictment of F. H. Newell, director of 

 the Reclamation Service: 



"For fourteen years practically every man own- 

 ing water rights under these projects has surren- 

 dered his rights to the Reclamation Service, and 

 nothing has yet been done. These countries have 

 been set back a generation through Newell's incom- 

 petency and prejudice. Newell has killed these coun- 

 tries, and it is felt that he has been a national calam- 

 ity. 



"If the rottenness and incompetency of Newell's 

 administration should ever be brought to light the 

 Eastern states would all be against any further 

 reclamation activity." 



Mr. Hill added that he hoped Newell would at- 

 tempt to make him prove his indictment in the 

 courts. Mr. Hill is a responsible citizen of consid- 

 erable wealth. The press wires carried his state- 



ment to all 'parts' of the nation. There was no re- 

 sponse from Newell. He has permitted the indict- 

 ment to go unchallenged. 



Xewell's defense always has been that the com- 

 plaints against his regime came only from a few 

 disgruntled settlers here and there. He has suc- 

 ceeded in making official Washington believe this, 

 and, aided by the powerful political interests to 

 whom he has been able to show very substantial 

 favors, he has hung on to his job and laughed and 

 smirked at the suffering settlers. 



The indictment brought against him by Mr. Hill 

 is not that of a poor, defenseless settler. The charge 

 is made by a man schooled in engineering affairs, 

 a thorough student of business, big and little; by a 

 man in constant touch with the men and women 

 who live on Federal projects ; by one who has oppor- 

 tunity to observe conditions on these projects and 

 compare them with conditions elsewhere. The in- 

 dictment is brought by a man who is recognized 

 among his fellows as brainy, conservative and care- 

 ful. 



We believe Secretary of the Interior Lane is al- 

 ready fully informed of the observations of Mr. Hill 

 and other big men of the West concerning Newell 

 and his activities. Why has Secretary Lane not 

 acted ? 



Surely he is not afraid of Newell and the pow- 

 erful interests who are backing him. We believe 

 Secretary Lane is too courageous to be frightened 

 even by such great political power. 



Or does Mr. Lane feel the same fear that is ex- 

 pressed in the last paragraph of Mr. Hill's indict- 

 ment that an exposure of Newell and his methods 

 will mean an end to Federal reclamation. If that 

 is the excuse for keeping Newell, THE IRRIGATION- 

 AGE contends that it is a very poor one. 



The East is too great, too patriotic, and, if not 

 these, too mercenary to halt a great work such as 

 Federal reclamation just because it may be shown 

 that more than one-third or one-half of a fund of 

 $100,000,000 has been lost or wasted or thrown away 

 through incompetency. No, the East will not stop 

 reclamation work, but instead, if told the truth, the 

 East and the South and the North will be found 

 working with the \Vest to clean out this incompe- 

 tency, to relieve the present burdensome conditions 

 under which the settlers are struggling, to eliminate 

 bureaucracy and bring about American rule, to 

 furnish funds to correct the errors and waste of the 

 past and to complete the projects, and to see to it 

 that the settlers on the Federal projects are made 

 to pay only for what they have actually received. 



It is time to tell the truth, and the full truth, 

 about Federal Reclamation. No threats by any 



