THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



269 



exert an influence to overcome the necessity of any- 

 one becoming homeless or propertyless. 



It has been the general opinion of the man on the 

 farm and who must pay for this reclamation that the 

 government should not encumber either the land wa- 

 tered by it or the non-irrigab!c land, or that watered 

 by the individual, but that the government should leave 

 these assets for use of the owner in preparing himself 

 to pay the government price for water. The present 

 system makes the water purchaser a quasi ward of the 

 government. It resembles in a measure the treatment 

 of the American Indian. The government required 

 the Indian to take his land in severally, then did not 

 permit him to sell it, obtain credit upon it, or to use it 

 as an asset. The same rule applied to the white man 

 would make him helpless and a failure on the farm, 

 but, probably, not to the same extent as the Indian has 

 been. 



The way to make the farmer progress under the 

 Reclamation projects is not to give him alms to weaken 

 his self-reliance, but to give him the liberty of use of 

 his property in making his own development. If the 

 government will give the farmer freedom of action in 

 the use of his land and a reasonable time in which to 

 pay for his water on such terms as private corpora- 

 tions or individuals have done, with the elimination of 

 the interest charge, then if the farmer does not succeed 

 in general it is a waste of effort to attempt to keep him 



on the farm, and the quicker he sells out and engages 

 in some other vocation the better it will be for the 

 government and the inefficient land owner. However, 

 the government cannot afford to make this water right 

 that it proposes to provide for the farmer by mere 

 advance of money without interest, an incumbrance 

 rather than an asset. 



The harsh and exacting system of administration 

 discourages and deters the poorer classes from trying 

 to water or develop a home on arid land. No feasible 

 system, manacled with hard and fast rules made 

 equally applicable to all arid lands scattered over dis- 

 tances of from fifteen hundred to two thousand miles, 

 while bodies of land in close proximity to each other 

 require different administration, can be even pass- 

 ably successful. 



What the farmer needs and must have to succeed 

 is liberty of opportunity to sell, trade, use and encum- 

 ber his lands in whole or part for the purpose of de- 

 velopng the same, stocking it or selling part to aid in 

 improving the remainder. No one not actually in the 

 harness and familiar with all the attending circum- 

 stances is qualified to say what is best for the farmer. 

 The best financial policy that can be furnished the 

 farmer is to relieve his land of all burdens, and allow 

 him to work out his own development in his own 

 chosen way. 



LANE DENIES PLEA OF BLACK CANYON SETTLERS 



A STORY by F. G. Burroughs, of Caldwell, Ida., 

 in the June issue of THE IRRIGATION AGE, told 

 how the settlers in the Black Canyon country the 

 abandoned portion of the Payette-Boise project 

 have struggled against almost insurmountable ob- 

 stacles. It told how these men, despite their de- 

 sertion by the Reclamation Service bureaucracy, 

 which had invited them to settle on this project, 

 have never lost faith in their government, and re- 

 mained enthusiastic, patriotic citizens. 



THE AGE commented editorially on this story 

 and urged Secretary of the Interior Lane to take 

 steps to carry out the promises of F. H. Newell and 

 his ilk, whom the Secretary is still keeping on the 

 government payroll. The Caldwell, Ida., News re- 

 printed THE AGE editorial on its front page. In its 

 editorial columns it had the following to say : 



"Returning members of the delegations which 

 visited Washington in the interests of the ]! lack- 

 Canyon report that Secretary Lane refuses to rec- 

 ognize the fact that the Black Canyon was orig- 

 inally a part of the Payette-Boise project and was 

 settled up as such. The Secretary is reported to 

 have said that 'While promises made by a preced- 

 ing Secretary of the Interior could not be regarded 

 as binding upon his successors in office, it would be 

 necessary to regard the Black Canyon as a new 

 undertaking,' and added the consolation that 'the 

 fact that the settlers there have endured and suf- 

 fered would certainly lodge in the minds of those 

 who will designate where new enterprises shall be 

 located.' 



"On another page we print an editorial written 

 by the editor of a great Chicago irrigation journal 



(THE IRRIGATION AGE), who has had exactly the 

 same facts presented to him that were shown to 

 Secretary Lane. It is a striking commentary upon 

 the difference between the cold-blooded official 

 viewpoint and that of a man whose heart is with 

 the irrigated west. 



''At that it is hard to see how the Secretary 

 reaches his viewpoint. The Black Canyon (or 

 North Side section of the Payette-Boise project) 

 WAS a part of the original project. The settlers 

 WERE induced to come and settle there upon the 

 same promises of the government and at the same 

 time as the completed section. The records of the 

 Reclamation Service DO PROVE this fact. Former 

 Secretaries of the Interior HAVE admitted that 

 this is a fact. And yet along comes Lane and says 

 that from HIS VIEWPOINT the Black Canyon 

 is to be regarded as a 'new undertaking' !" 



HELPS THE "STUNG" HOMESTEADER 



W. A. Ryan, comptroller of the Reclamation 

 Commission, announced a new policy of Secretary 

 of the Interior Lane during his recent visit to the 

 Uncompahgre project in Colorado. 



He said that where a homesteader has taken 

 up a homestead under the project and after living 

 on it for the allotted time it is found that his land 

 is not irrigable or not feasible under the project, 

 the department is inclined to permit him to relin- 

 quish the non-irrigable homestead and select from 

 the land under the project unentered, but at present 

 withdrawn, another homestead, giving him credit 

 on the new homestead for all the conditions he has 

 already fulfilled on the original homestead. 



