USA > California > History of California, Volume V > Part 23
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Coal is a good example of the prodigality of the public with and the wastefulness of private exploitation of natural resources. For every ton of coal that has been mined and used in this country, another ton has been abandoned and lost in the mines-not because it would not have paid to mine the abandoned ton, but because it better paid the private owner of the coal to mine the one ton and abandon the other. The result is that the coal deposits of this country will be exhausted much sooner than would have been the case had the mines been properly worked.
The coal that the public gave away has been so mono- polized that only a quantity sufficient to keep the coal market starved is mined. Thus the coal necessities of the public force higher prices for the coal than would obtain were not this natural resource privately monopolized. Similar conditions prevail with regard to iron and other metals and minerals which the public has given away.
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Agricultural lands, next to water the most necessary of all the natural resources, have been fairly well conserved. The majority of private land owners are more interested in conserving than in destroying the fertility of their lands. The opinion is fast gaining ground that, from the standpoint of the public good, it is better to conserve for all time the fertility of agricul- tural lands than to destroy it through the use of gold- dredgers in order to realize even very large immediate returns.
The demand for conservation of natural resources is of recent growth in this country. In California and nearly everywhere else in this nation, those resources were originally so enormous in extent and quantity that they seemed to be inexhaustible. No sooner was one frontier peopled and its natural resources given away into private ownership than another step took the adventurous into new, virgin regions, with a new, natural resource wealth to be disposed of. Reckless waste and destruction, for personal financial aggran- dizement has been the rule; and he was laughed at who ventured to sound a warning of future dearth.
Steadily, step by step, from the Atlantic to the Pacific, have our natural resources fallen into private ownership. The best of the public lands is all taken up; coal, iron, oil, and other minerals have been monop- olized; whole states have been deforested, and within half a century from now all the existing privately owned forests will have been destroyed, and the only timber that will be left will be in the conserved national forests and parks.
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On the Pacific coast sufficient time has not elapsed to permit results of the destruction of natural resources to become apparent to everybody. But with a con- stantly increasing population, and with not only the United States but foreign countries drawing upon them, the value of the Pacific coast forests is rapidly increasing with the result of increasing monopoly and growing rate of destruction, which are detrimental, in a financial and economic sense, to the great mass of the present and future inhabitants of the coast and the country.
It is not necessary to preserve forests unused in order to conserve them. Preservation of forests, of any natural resource, is, in fact, not a conservation of them -they must be used to conserve them-properly used to properly conserve them. Conservation of natural resources, such as forests, which may be used and not destroyed, is the antithesis of preservation and also of destruction. Forests in other countries long have been, are still being used and not destroyed-are being con- served. Our national forests under governmental con- trol are being conserved. But practically every natural resource other than land, forests, and water must finally be destroyed, if, as they should be, they are continuously used. Water, however, is perennial. It will always be found in the channels in which it is accustomed to run, even if the quantity so running be limited and variable from season to season. But the places in which it may be conveniently and economically reservoired in California are so readily counted; the localities at which it may be easily harnessed for power purposes or cheaply diverted from the streams for irrigation are so few; and
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the area of irrigable land is so great that a monopoly of the state's water resources holds out greater Midas- like possibilities than any other monopoly can.
GOLD, THE FIRST GREAT LURE TO CALIFORNIA
When, by the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, the United States, in 1848, came into possession of Cali- fornia, the unreckonable extent and value of the state's natural resources were not dreamed of. Its acquisition was opposed by men of the highest standing and influ- ence in the councils of the nation, on the grounds, among others, that its soil was infertile; its climate arid; its coast rock-bound, fog-bathed, inhospitable; its torrid valleys uninhabitable and uncultivable; and its for- bidding mountains unsurmountable by those who would be brave and enduring enough to attempt to cross the "Great American Desert."
Hardly was the ink dry on the signatures to the treaty when Marshall made his discovery. Then began one of the greatest and most momentous migrations the world has ever known. Gold was freely offered to all who would come and take it. The adventurous young from every walk of life throughout the civilized world hastened to California and filled her mountains with restless, all-compelling men.
Deceived by the reports concerning the unfavorable character of the country, the Argonauts came here with the intention of remaining only long enough to make their fortunes. To them the dry valleys, the great trees, the lakes, the rivers did not appeal. Of the gold- seeking period there is, therefore, little to say concern- ing any conservation of California's natural resources.
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To those men there was but one resource worth considering, viz, gold. The forests were useful to furnish lumber for sluice boxes, flumes, cabins; they were nuisances when they interfered with mining operations. Water? It was a blessing when it could be used for rockers, long toms, sluices; when rivers were to be turned from their channels in order to glean gold, it was a curse. Agriculture, viticulture, horticulture? The man had lost his reason who imagined that those sun baked valleys and red soiled foothills could yield a living to their cultivators.
It was an army of careless young men who were drawn hither by the gold discovery; yet what they did, they did with all their might. Did the state need a constitution? They dropped their shovels and picks for a moment and sent down to Monterey their representatives. There these men, the pick of all the world, constructed a constitution better than the organic law then possessed by any state in the union. Childless and not intending themselves to live in "barren" California, they did their best in constitution making, as they did in everything else, and provided even for a free public school system crowned by a free State University. Unconscious of the application of the word "conservation," they prepared the way for the conservation of California's brains and California's intellect.
Having done these great things for the conservation of civilization here, these young men continued their work of destruction of natural resources. They tore down mountains, and washed them into the rivers, filling the streams with debris, which subsequently
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caused them to burst their banks and flood and bury farms and orchards under infertile "slickens." They soon rendered unnavigable the lower reaches of some of the streams upon which they were dependent for the cheap transportation of the things they needed. When they abandoned the sites of their great works they left them scarred, gashed, stripped. On all sides are the monumental evidences of their destructive prodigality which has plagued their successors, and caused all to wonder at, even while they murmur over, the gigantic recklessness of their accomplishment. They were restrained by no laws save those of their own making, which permitted the doing of almost anything that would forward their enterprises. Looking forward to no future of the country for themselves, they recked nothing of the morrow-today was theirs, the morrow interested them not at all.
They were great men, those pioneers of forty-nine and fifty; great in intellect, in daring, in determination, in achievement. But they established customs of prod- igality in the use of California's wonderful natural resources that tinctures even the Californians of today, and causes many of them to resent and oppose any proposal to conserve for their own and their children's benefit the natural resources upon which the prosperity and progress of California's people depend.
CONSERVATION OF PUBLIC LANDS
The act of congress under which California was admitted to the union reserved to the federal govern- ment the public lands within the state, with the excep- tion of the 16th and 32d section in each township.
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These lands, with 500,000 additional acres, were given to the state as an endowment for her public schools. Later, the nation also gave the state certain swamp and overflow lands, totalling something like one million acres. Later still, there were set aside to the state other large areas of the public lands, amounting to over 200,000 acres.
The lands set apart for California's public schools amounted, as near as may be reckoned, to something like five and one-half million acres. These lands con- tained valuable agricultural, oil, mining, and forest lands, and valuable power and diversion sites and water-rights. Yet the state, with true California prod- igality, has frittered away nearly all the valuable lands so given to her. From the beginning, the state sold, at the rate of one dollar and a quarter per acre, lands worth, at the time of sale, many times that amount- sold it without any reservation of whatever mineral or other rights there might be appertaining to it, and without any investigation whatever as to its forest covering, its agricultural value, its availability for power sites, or its adjoining water-rights. Not until 1911 did the legislature even raise the price of the unsold school lands from one dollar and a quarter to two dollars and a half per acre. It was the policy of the state to dispose of its patrimony with Prodigal Son-like rapidity. Minnesota has no state taxes-the royalties from the state owned iron mines provide ample funds for state expenses. Texas, retaining ownership of her public lands, is enormously wealthy.
The legislature of 1911, in regular session, created the Conservation Commission of the State of California,
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and instructed it to investigate the natural resources of the state, among which were enumerated the state owned lands. The commission found that there had been kept no adequate or systematic records of the sale of the state lands, the amount that has been sold, or the amount remaining unsold. After a careful inves- tigation of the records at Sacramento and in the general land office at Washington, the commission found that there appear to be something like one million acres of school lands remaining unsold. The uncertainty as to the exact amount results from the facts that certain of the 16th and 32d sections are swamp and overflow lands, or mineral, or desert lands, or are contained in national forests and parks, or have been covered by government or state scrip, or have been taken in lieu of other land. But the results of the investigation are sufficient to show that not only has the far greater part of the patrimony of California's school children been sold at a fraction of its real value at the time of sale, but that large amounts of school lands have been lost through frauds and felonies.
Up to December 31, 1912, California had received from the sale of her school lands only $5,934,062.27. The average value of the lands, even when sold, was, no doubt, ten dollars per acre; much of it was worth several times that sum. Instead of our schools receiv- ing only $5,934,062.27, the endowment ought to have netted at least $40,000,000; and instead of an income of less than $300,000 from land sale sources for the support of our public schools, that income should now be not less than $2,000,000.
The legislature, at the extraordinary session of 1911,
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withdrew from sale for two years the remaining school lands, pending investigation of their real value. The legislature of 1913 extended the withdrawal period for two more years. But neither legislature provided any machinery or money to bring about that investi- gation and valuation. Much of the remaining lands are wild mountain lands, on which there are, in all prob- ability, valuable power and reservoir sites, and adjacent to which are, very probably, valuable water-rights; and some of these lands, too, are probably covered with valuable forests or contain minerals or oil.
Practically every acre of the enormously valuable swamp and overflow lands given to the state by the federal government has been frittered away by the state. The 1,000,000 acres of that land, now worth from $100 to $500, or more, per acre, were sold by the state at one dollar per acre. One of the conditions of the gift to the state and of the sale by the state was that that those to whom the state should sell it should reclaim the land, so that it might be made productive. Much of that land has not yet been reclaimed. Even if the million acres sold by the state at one dollar per acre had been sold for only ten dollars per acre (and many of those who bought from the state at one dollar sold the unreclaimed land at ten or more dollars per acre) the school fund of the state would have been increased by $9,000,000.
It will thus be seen that had the lands given to the state been properly conserved, the people would have been relieved of a large percentage of the many millions of dollars now annually required of them for the support of the public schools.
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The University of California, having been admin- istered by a careful board of regents, has taken better care of its land-patrimony than the legislature has taken of the public-school lands. Its 200,000 acres have been sold for $886,945.41 ; and its income from that source is annually $49,668.93. Had the school lands been sold for even equal prices, the school-fund would now contain $21,000,000, instead of less than $6,000,000.
The federal government exacted no tribute, either from foreigners or citizens, for the gold taken from its lands in California. Other nations exact a fixed per- centage from even their own citizens who mine the precious metals. But the American people have always assumed that the precious metals, although the prop- erty of all the people, are at the free disposal of all who wish to take them. The result has been that enormous quantities of our gold and other precious and semi-precious metals and other natural resources have gone to enrich the subjects of other nations, without toll or tribute.
Mining was the overshadowing, practically the only, industry of the new state of California, and the miner was permitted to carry on his operations with only scant regard for the rights of others. He destroyed forests, denuded great areas of their soil, clogged streams, rendered rivers unnavigable, and did great damage to the public domain and private property. But, as the fertile valleys became more settled, and farming, horticulture, and other similar industries began to be practiced, the farmer objected to the miner floating debris down upon his farm and protested against such destructive operations.
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In 1850 steamboats drawing three and four feet of water ascended the Sacramento river to the Feather, up the Feather to the Yuba, and up the Yuba to Marysville, landing their passengers at the foot of a bluff-bank, up which they scrambled to the city's streets. In those days Marysville required no high levees to protect her from the Yuba's floods. Now she is surrounded by high levees, the top of the Yuba's bed is nearly at the level of the city's streets, and no steamboat has landed at the city for many years. All this is the result of the work of the hydraulic miners on the headwaters of the Yuba.
CONSERVATION OF AGRICULTURAL LANDS
It was not until early in the seventies of the last century that the farmers of the Sacramento valley were really able to make themselves heard. They organized "Anti-Debris Associations" and "Protective Associations"; they employed lawyers to bring injunc- tion suits; they appealed to the legislature and to congress for relief. But the mining interests were so strongly intrenched, so dominant in politics and in the creation of public opinion that, try as they might, the agriculturists made slow headway in compelling the miners to respect their rights. Some ineffective legislation was passed as early as 1855; and the legisla- ture of 1875-6 asked congress for legislation to conserve from further damage by mining operations other industries and properties. Nothing came of this; and it was not until 1893 that the legislature passed an act so regulating hydraulic mining that it could be carried on only in such a manner as to prevent material
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injury to streams and the lands adjacent thereto. This practically stopped hydraulic mining; and the state, in conjunction with federal engineers, has, after several failures and the expenditure of large sums of money, succeeded in confining the riotous Yuba within its banks and in preventing the constant flow from that river into the Feather and the Sacramento of the enormous amount of "slickens" that, coming down from the hydraulic mines, filled the Yuba's bed in places to a depth of two hundred feet.
The legislature of 1877-8 passed an act to provide a system of irrigation, promote drainage, and improve the navigation of the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers. Under this act a state engineer was appointed who proceeded to make stream-gaugings and to do other necessary work preliminary to carrying out the provi- sions of the act. In 1885 the engineer published his report on irrigation, a very valuable document, con- taining exact information concerning streams and stream-flow. But before the provisions of the act could be complied with and the work called for by it done, the legislature of 1887-8 repealed the act and abolished the office of state engineer; and nothing of any consequence was done along these lines for a number of years. Since 1903, however, under authori- zation by the legislature, the work has been continued under a newly-created state engineer, acting in con- junction with the United States department of agricul- ture, the state conservation and water commissions and the United States geological survey. Steps have also been taken for cooperative work between the owners,
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the state, and the federal government to reclaim the valuable swamp and overflow lands along the rivers.
FOREST CONSERVATION
The original forests of California were among the most magnificent of all the world. Redwood and pine and other conifera covered approximatey 30,000,000 of the state's 100,000,000 acres. Nearly all of these forests lie in the northern three-quarters of the state; and of these three-quarters practically forty per cent are or were forest lands. The United States has disposed of enormous areas of California's forests; most of it in quarter section tracts at two dollars and a half per acre. Of our enormous area of unique redwoods, none remains in public ownership. When the state, a few years ago, purchased something like one thousand five hundred acres of redwood lands for a public park, it paid $250,000 for what the nation had parted with for a song.
Those who purchased forest lands from the govern- ment made oath that they took them for themselves and not for other people. There were and are other restrictions in the law for the prevention of private monopoly-areas of the public lands. But, nevertheless, by evading the law, by fraudulent floutings of it, even by felonious breakings of it, by lieu-land and other scrip, and by numerous other legal, extra-legal, and illegal methods, enormous tracts of California forest lands have fallen into private ownership. Such lands, for which the people received two dollars and fifty cents per acre, are now held at prices up to five hundred dollars and more per acre.
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The report of the conservation commission of California for 1913 shows the following table of forest- lands in private holdings in this state, in areas of 5,000 acres or more:
Approx. acreage of
individual holdings
Number of holders
Acreage
Over 500,000
2
1,536,238
100,000
I
156,696
50,000
6
399,809
20,000
21
671,155
15,000
18
304,757
10,000
19
236,052
66
5,000
41
279,654
Totals . . . . . . . 108
3,584,361
Average holding for each of the 108.
33,225
One of the two largest holdings is a railroad grant-gift, made by the federal government, nearly half a century ago, to the California and Oregon Railroad Company. Among the conditions of this grant, given to aid the company in building its road, were that the land should be sold, in parcels not greater than 160 acres, for not more than $2.50 per acre, to "actual settlers." The evident object of congress was the cheap and quick settlement of the central northern part of California. The company, however, has not observed these condi- tions of the gift, but has sold large quantities of the land in larger parcels than 160 acres, at more than $2.50 per acre, and to others than actual settlers. Its contention is that, while it is prohibited from selling in greater quantities than 160 acres and at greater prices than $2.50 per acre to actual settlers, the terms of the act do not apply to its relations with others than
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actual settlers. And construing the latter term as referring only to those who had actually settled in the country contiguous to the line of its road previous to the date of the grant, the corporation has for many years refused to sell any of its granted forest lands to anybody. It, no doubt, claims that there are none of the original "actual settlers" living in that section of the country who want to buy any of its lands, and that it is not compelled to sell to anybody else.
The company, given these lands-something like 3,000,000 acres of them-for the double purpose of aiding it in building its road and in settling up the country, is keeping them in order that it may finally realize enormous prices for them. It also demands that we, having given it those lands, shall be required to pay it passenger and freight rates large enough to yield returns upon the constantly appreciating value of these lands. Mr. Harriman, asked at a public meeting why his company was holding these lands, replied: "For the benefit of future generations of American citizens."
Under that grant and others of similar nature, the Southern Pacific Company, the successor in interest of the original grantee, now holds something like 821,078 acres of California forest land. Another holder owns at least 715, 160 acres of them. If 60 other corporations or individuals each owned an area of California's territory equal to those two holdings, every inch of California's enormous area-the second largest in the union-would be privately owned.
Neither of these two owners is cutting any of the timber on these great holdings; but, with quite a
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number of other owners of large areas, both are holding the timber for the constantly increasing prices which decreasing supply and increasing demand are fast bringing about.
The withholding from use, the preservation intact, of forests is not conservation of forest natural resources. The term "conservation" carries with it the postulate of use. The non use of forests is simply the wasteful preservation of that which may be used without destruction. It is the holding for greater values and profits, at the expense of the people, that which the people gave away with the understanding that it would be used for the benefit of the donors. Because certain forests are held out of use, their value and the value of those that are being used, as well as the products thereof, are constantly increasing. Unused forests are one cause of the rapid and wasteful destruc- tion of other forests, as well as of loss through the non use of ripe trees.
That forests may be conserved, that is, used without being destroyed, is proven by the experience of other countries. The forests of nearly all the countries of Europe are publicly owned and conserved; and many of these publicly owned forests have long since ceased to be charges upon the public treasuries. Germany's forests are a source of considerable profit to that govern- ment; and the same is true of the forests of France, Switzerland, and other European countries. Privately owned forests always have been destroyed, always will be destroyed, as more money can be quickly madeby destroying than by conserving them.
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