Democratic Sentinel, Volume 9, Number 46, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 18 December 1885 — THE PUBLIC DOMAIN. [ARTICLE]

THE PUBLIC DOMAIN.

Annual Report of Mr. Sparks, Commissioner of the General Land Office. The annual report of Hon. William A. J. Sparks, Commissioner of the General Land Office, states that during the last fiscal yoar the sales, entries and selections of public land under various acts of Congress relating thereto embrace 20,113.663.37 acres, and of Indian lands 881,850.21 acres, making a total of 20,995,513.58 acres, being an increase, us compared with the year 188-1, of 6,535,650.41 acres, and an increase over the year 1883 of 1,562,480.76 acres. The receipts from the disposals of public lands ore $7,680,111.80; from salen of Indian lands, $933,483.52; a total of $8,019,508,32, being a decrease, as compared with tho venr 1884, ot $4,159,532.01, and with 1883 of $3,080,107.33, to which is to be added $8,821.86 for certified copies of records furnished by the General Land Office, making tho total reoeipts for the your from all sources $8,028,420.18. Surveys have been extended during tho last five years fur beyond tho needs of legitimate occupation of tho soil. Nearly tho whole of the Territory of Wyoming anil large portions of Montana huve been surveyed under the deposit system, and the lands on the streams fraudulently taken up under the desert-land act, to the exclusion of future settlors desiring homos in thoßo Territories. Nearly all of Colorado, the choicest cattle-raising portions of Now Mexico, tho accessible timber landsof California, largely the forests of Washington Territory, and the principal part of tho pine lands of Minnesota aro already surveyed, anil in all tho Westora land States and Territories tho surveys havo anticipated actual populations for. years to come. To enable the pressing tide of Western immigration to seouro homes upon the public domain it is necessary, not that further surveys should be hastened, but that tho hundreds of millions of acres of public lands now unlawfully appropriated should bo wrested from illegal control. The Commissioner reports that ninety-eight land claims, founded on Spanish and Mexican grants, are pending, covering 8,590,000 acres, which are based upon the reports of Surveyor Generals, and not scrutinized in the land office. He recommends that no Buoh claims should be confirmed without examination by the office, and in the field, and that as thirty years have elapsed since tho passage of tho act under which the claims aro presented, an act should be passed limiting the time for such presentation to ono year. Grants have been made to aid in tho construction of 10,129 miles of road, of whioh 7,098 mileß have not yet been completed. Of the landß granted 14,929,121 acres have been patented, leaving 100,900,000 acres of unpatonted lands included in all the grantß subject to forfeiture, an area equal to that of tho combined States of Now York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland and. Virginia. Tho right of the Government thereto being a legal one, the default of tho companies being voluntary, the powor of Congress to declaro a forfeiture Bhould be exorcised. The Commissioner, referring to alleged fraudulent land entries in regions dominated by tho cattle companies, says that he has suspended tho issue of patents thereon until a full examination of tho bona fldo character of the applications can be made. He suggests tho repeal of tho pre-emption system, of commuted homesteads, of the ttmber-culturo law, of tho desertlaud act, and of all general provisions of law authorizing sales of land for cash, und restricting tho sale to the actual settler, because they offer covers for fraudulent transactions. The Commissioner recommends tho abolitiou of the foe system in tho registry offices, and that measures bo tukon to preserve the forests on the public domain.