60 BULLETIN 1001, U. S. DEPARTMENT OE AGRICULTURE. 



It should thus be clear that while the permit system is perhaps the 

 best single system that has so far been devised for the management 

 of these arid grazing lands, not the least of its advantages is that it 

 does not necessarily interfere with the application of the homestead 

 policy, the consolidation plan, or a lease law in the regions where these 

 methods are desirable. 



It is not intended to suggest or assume that a permit system is 

 flawless. It has certain well-known disadvantages. Not the least 

 important of these is the necessity of a complex supervisory authority. 

 In operation, more or less friction between officials and permittees 

 will occur because of differences of judgment as to the use of the lands. 

 This difficulty can only be mimmized, not obviated. Organization 

 of the stockmen and the creation of advisory boards for consultation 

 with the administrative authorities have gone far toward reducing 

 such friction in the National Forests. 



In administering the permit system in the National Forests it was 

 found necessary, for a long time, to issue annual permits to stockmen 

 in order that the necessary adjustments of numbers of animals to 

 available feed might be made each year, and the greatest number of 

 permittees be thus accommodated. Not until after the stock business 

 of a region becomes tolerably well stabilized and the use holdings 

 definitely located, is it possible to lengthen the period for which 

 permit is issued. Even then the long-term permit must be hedged 

 about by various restrictions and limitations that make it look like a 

 doubtful asset to the permittee. These necessary limitations of the 

 system usually cause permittees to delay construction of all perma- 

 nent improvements because they are not certain that they will profit 

 by such improvements enough to warrant the expenses involved. 

 A policy of absorption by the Government of the property rights 

 in such permanent improvements also causes the permittees to avoid 

 or delay making such improvements. This policy doubtless is 

 derived from the custom of assuming that all permanent improve- 

 ments necessarily belong to the owner of the land upon which they 

 may be made. 



These difficulties, however, are not insurmountable. An annual 

 permit becomes the equivalent of a long-term permit if it may be 

 renewed each year for an indefinite period. Restrictions that limit 

 one to the best kind of use are restrictions in name only, even if they 

 do appear quite portentous when written into a contract. Nor is it 

 necessary that improvements put upon the land should thereafter be 

 permanently attached to the land. Many forms of lease give the 

 tenant right to remove improvements made by himself from the land 

 of his landlord. In certain of the Australian colonies, improvements 

 are recognized as belonging to the lessee, and when made on Crown 

 lands the improvements may be removed, sold to the next tenant, 



