16 THE COMMISSION OF INQUIRY, 



may at any time see fit to impose for the protection and betterment of 

 public welfare. 



Protection of the State's interest requires action by the legislature at 

 as early a date as possible. The particular parcels of forfeited tax land, 

 having value in the way suggested, can not be readily or quickly ascer- 

 tained; nor would it be wise to point them out publicly, in advance of 

 legislative action, as that would enable speculators to take them up 

 under the present law before the legislature can act. It is essential that 

 the forfeited tax land be withdrawn from sale or other disposition (ex- 

 cept redemption of State tax land in the Auditor General's Department 

 by the owner of the record title) while action along the lines recom- 

 mended in this report is under consideration by the legislature. Action 

 of this nature, immediately upon the convening of the legislature, is 

 earnestly recommended as of great importance for the preservation of 

 public interests. 



(4) The laws allowing sales of tax homestead land have not con- 

 trihuted materially to hring in actual settlers. 



It seems to be well established by our investigations that the laws 

 under which tax homestead lands have been sold have contributed to 

 the actual settlement of the regions of cut-over lands but very little. 

 Some of this land brought by speculators is resold at large advance in 

 prices, and often after the stripping of the timber. But it is compara- 

 tiveJy seldom that the mau who is seeking a home buys tax homestead 

 land; if he wishes such land he takes it up under the homestead law. 

 Most of the sales of tax homestead land are to those who buy in order 

 to strip the land of timber on it, or to acquire it for ranches to be 

 used as cattle or sheep ranges. Some is bought for sporting or game 

 preserves; some to control the flowage as already stated; some for sum- 

 mer resort purposes ; some as a measure of tax dodging. ( See the state- 

 ment in Appendix 4, of Wm. H. Rose, Commissioner of the State Land 

 OfSce.) 



All the sales that have been made in the Land OfiSce are shown by 

 statements prepared in that oflSce for this Commission. These state- 

 ments will be filed with this report but are not printed. Examination 

 of these will disclose that most of the land sold in any county taken 

 as a sample, was sold in many parcels, but in large aggregate acreage, 

 to a few individuals or corporations. It is evident from such an ex- 

 amination (see Appendix 2, Part II.) that the purchasers of very much 

 the greatest part of the acreage were not persons who designed to settle 

 on the land purchased. 



(5) The present law, loth the feature allowing sales and that allow- 

 ing homesteading, is operating to the devastation of great areas, and to 

 the rapid destruction of the capacity of the cut-over lands of the north 

 to reforest naturally without artificial aid. 



The results of our investigations show that the most of the forfeited 

 tax land that the State disposes of is acquired primarily for the pur- 

 pose of stripping it of timber. So far as sales are concerned we have 

 already sufficiently covered this subject. It is a matter of common 

 knowledge in the State. 



