G. 0. Smith — Government Geological Surveys. 185 



ate in this form. The Legislative Appropriation bill was 

 similarly pruned, while in the Senate, of all reference to 

 the proposed new organization. This bill, however, died 

 in conference, but in the last hours of the session the 

 conferees on the Sundry Civil bill took unto themselves 

 legislative powers and transferred from the dead bill to 

 the pending measure all the language which constitutes 

 the "organic act" of the United States Geological Sur- 

 vey. This action was denounced in the Senate as "a 

 wide departure from the authority that is possessed by 

 a conference committee," and it was further stated in 

 debate that the inserted provision which created a new 

 office and discontinued the existing surveys was one 

 "which neither the Committee of the Senate nor the Sen- 

 ate itself ever saw." This assertion was perhaps par- 

 liamentary sound in that the language was new to the 

 Sundry Civil bill, yet actually the Senate had only two 

 days before stricken the same proposed legislation from 

 the pending Legislative Appropriation bill. However; 

 the House conferees — Representatives Atkins of Tennes- 

 see, Hewett of New York, and Hale of Maine — had real- 

 ized their tactical advantage, and the Senate, after a 

 brief debate, voted on March 3 to concur in the report of 

 the committee of conference, thus reversing all their 

 earlier action, in which the friends of the Hayden and 

 Wheeler organizations apparently had commanded more 

 votes than the advocates of the National Academy plan. 

 Clarence King was appointed first Director of the 

 United States Geological Survey on April 3, 1879, and 

 began the work of organization. With his proven genius 

 for administration, King promptly resolved the doubt as 

 to the meaning of the term "national domain" in the 

 language defining the duties of the Director by taking the 

 conservative side and limiting the work of the new organ- 

 ization to the region west of the 102d meridian. This 

 region was divided into four geological divisions, and for 

 economy of . time and money field headquarters were 

 established for these divisions. The Division of the 

 Bocky Mountains was placed under Mr. Emmons as 

 geologist in charge, the Division of the Colorado under 

 Captain Dutton, the Division of the Great Basin under 

 Mr. Gilbert, and the Division of the Pacific under Arnold 

 Hague. The Division of the Colorado was intended as 

 merely temporary for the purpose of bringing to comple- 



