he presented to Mr. Garfield and from whom he received a fee of $200 or $250, which, as he understood, was simply for traveling expenses. He denied Mr. Glavis's statements about political contributions. The other claims he urged in letters to his former subordinate and successor, Mr. Dennett, as a matter of accommodation. He understood that the law which forbade any person to act as agent in any case of a claim against the Government within two years of being an employee of the Department did not apply to land claims. He told, however, how he took pains to avoid having anything to do with these cases after being Secretary of the Interior. He denied that he had any interests in Alaska, and said he had known nothing of his First Assistant Secretary's opinion which, it is asserted, would have allowed these claims to be patented. He said he knew nothing of Mr. Glavis's attack on him until he received the President's letter informing him of it. Later in his testimony he asserted emphatically that the statements in the letter of Judge Ronald to the Editor-in-Chief of The Outlook were true. Mr. Ballinger explained these statements by saying that Special Agent Jones had sent simply two affidavits about the Cunningham claims; that Mr. Glavis's telegram was not in the nature of a protest; and that the Cale Bill was not beneficial to the Cunningham claimants.

>>

He

one subordinate as the result of mistaking an order for a mere suggestion; and the action of another as the result of mistaking a suggestion for an order. denied that he had ordered the Reclamation Service officials to recommend to him that certain withdrawn lands be restored to entry; but he made plain that he had expressed to them unmistakably his strong opinion that such lands had been withdrawn illegally and should be restored. He referred to correspondence to sustain this view. He repeated what he has said on other occasions, that he could find no warrant for supervisory power of the executive. He declared that he could find no statutory power to withdraw water power sites or forest ranger stations; and no legal power even to withdraw lands temporarily so as to call the attention of Congress to the need of new laws. He admitted, however, that he had not restored all lands so withdrawn, and even had made "expediency withdrawals on no better legal basis. In opposition to judicial opinions quoted in favor of the President's power of withdrawal, Mr. Ballinger introduced in evidence a brief prepared by the Assistant AttorneyGeneral assigned to his department. garding the co-operative certificates, he reiterated the view that they were illegal ; but objected principally because they did not allow accurate estimates to be made of final cost. These certificates were a bookkeeping arrangement by which the people to be benefited by irrigation could help the Government construct the channels and thus help to pay for the cost of the work. Mr. Ballinger said that in his opinion the contract system was not only the one legal way of constructing these great works but the only businesslike way. He held to his proposed plan of reorganizing the Reclamation Service which would have made the Director one of three officials reporting to him, instead of the single chief of the bureau. As to the case of the engineer of the service who received from a railway with which as a Government official he had dealings a regular monthly check of five hundred. dollars for lecturing, Mr. Ballinger said that he had not only not removed him but had given him larger powers. He

Re

did not explain this further except to say that he did it on the report of investigators. He expressed his anger at the Director of the Service for receiving and filing without reference to him a report of a previous investigation which he felt reflected on him as head of the Department. To demonstrate his practical acquaintance with the affairs of his Department, Mr. Ballinger said: "I traveled something over 20,000 miles this last summer, visiting reclamation projects, Indian agencies and Indian reservations, and National parks, to familiarize myself with the conditions in the field. I think I visited more than half of the reclamation projects. Some of the time I was with the Irrigation Committee of the Senate, and some of the time I was accompanied by Mr. Davis, and part of the time Mr. Newell accompanied me in my investigations, and some of the projects I visited neither Mr. Davis nor Mr. Newell were present, as, for instance, the Sun River project in Arizona and the Truckee-Carson project in Nevada." He expressed his opposition to establishing forest reserves where there are no trees, though upon questioning from the Committee he qualified that statement by saying that he believed in reforestation. His last words on that subject, however, were skeptical; particularly about planting trees on the treeless plains of the Middle West. He criticised the Forestry Service for what he regarded as attempts to misrepresent him publicly; and explained that his silence and the silence of his subordinates in regard to these attempts were due to his obedience of instructions from his superiors, specifically instructions from the President. He contradicted two or three statements made by Mr. Garfield, his predecessor, and told how he had praised Mr. Garfield's administration. Perhaps most important of all, he told of his vindication by the Department of Agriculture. He stated that since Mr. Pinchot's retirement there had been a big change in the forestry policy; that he himself had that day (Thursday of last week) signed orders restoring several hundred thousand acres of land to entry; and that in the last two months four million acres had been thrown out of the forest

MR. GLAVIS AND

The Pinchot-Ballin

It

THE ATTORNEY-GENERAL ger Investigating Committee has denied to Mr. Brandeis, counsel for Mr. L. R. Glavis, his request that the Committee ask the Attorney-General to produce certain documents regarding Mr. Glavis's dismissal. Briefly, the situation is this: Mr. Glavis, finding, as he thought, matters going wrong in the Land Office, of which he was an employee, submitted a statement of facts to the President. was referred to the Attorney-General. After consideration, the President dismissed Mr. Glavis on the ground that he had brought unfounded charges against his superior. Mr. Glavis's counsel has been assiduous in seeking for the evidence on which the Attorney-General based his report adverse to Mr. Glavis. This report was not made public at the time of Mr. Glavis's dismissal. Mr. Brandeis has asked that the Attorney-General be requested to furnish the Committee with such memoranda as he had in the preparation of his report, so that Mr. Glavis may know the details of the charges against him, and so that he may know their source. This request the Committee has denied. It has furthermore denied Mr.. Brandeis's request that Secretary Ballinger be requested to furnish such memoranda. The only request concerning these data granted is that certain subordinates be asked for such memoranda

as they may have. The reason given for the denial-a reason expressed with some impatience by Senator Root-is that it is not the function of this Committee to investigate the Attorney-General's office. The Committee by this action has put Mr. Ballinger in the unfortunate position of taking refuge in the Attorney-General's immunity. Mr. Glavis has a right to know the sources of all charges against him. It does not seem fair that Mr. Ballinger's administration should escape any scrutiny by virtue of the fact that some of its affairs have been submitted to the Attorney-General for consideration. The sus picion, raised by Mr. Brandeis, that the Attorney-General's opinion contains material that could not have been obtained until after the day it was dated does not affect the duty of the investigating com

mittee to make the search thorough. This action of the Committee in denying Mr. Brandeis's request is likely to do more than even certain remarks of its members to create the impression that party considerations are affecting their conduct. This impression will be deepened by the fact that the votes-except that of the Insurgent member, Mr. Madison, who voted with the Democrats to make the request for the document were divided on party lines. Any effort to conceal the facts now must result in harm to the Administration. Already a resolution conforming to Mr. Brandeis's request has been introduced into the House of Representatives. If the next House should be Democratic, this incident might furnish an occasion for a partisan investigation into the AttorneyGeneral's office. Mr. Ballinger's volunteered statement that no such memoranda were in his possession or the possession of the Department of the Interior might well be supplemented by a voluntary statement on the part of the AttorneyGeneral, or even, if necessary, by the President himself.

PUBLIC PROPERTY AND THE CORPORATIONS

When Mr. Ballinger became Secretary of the Interior, he found that his predecessor, acting on information supplied by the Reclamation Service, had withdrawn from private entry a large tract of the public domain, in order to save water power sites from falling into the hands of private interests. Mr. Ballinger, within a few weeks, restored these lands to private entry. Later, he made rewithdrawals of part of this land. For the information on which he made these withdrawals he turned, not to the Reclamation Service, but to the Geological Survey. At that time, and ever since, Mr. Ballinger has shown special confidence in Mr. George Otis Smith, head of the Geological Survey. This fact makes Mr. Smith's testimony before the PinchotBallinger Investigating Committee particularly significant. The Outlook has already reported a large part of Mr. Smith's testimony under direct examination. In his further testimony Mr. Smith made it even clearer than before that he regarded it as a wise policy to promote the passing of public land into private

ownership. He, for instance, stated that he thought that a law which had for its purpose the passing of the public land, so far as possible, into private ownership was a good law. In this respect he expressed himself as differing from Mr. Newell, the head of the Reclamation Serv

ice.

He furthermore, on cross-examination, expressed his opinion that it was hurtful to call a halt on the patenting of public coal lands in Alaska. He had gone even further in answering certain questions by a member of the Committee. The purport of his answers was that it was desirable to hand over these coal lands in Alaska to great corporations. He did not seem to think it was essential even to prevent the same concern from owning both the coal mines and the railways to transport the coal. Indeed, he thought that even in the United States "possibly there is danger in this method of indirectly controlling the price of anthracite coal by trying to prevent the transportation companies also having an interest in the production of the article which they carry." If the railways were permitted to own and operate the coal mines, he thought the tendency would be toward what he regarded as Conservation. "I should say," he continued, "that the operation of the coal mines by the large and strong interests which also control the railways in a given field would be a conserving practice, because it would involve the large units. "In the interest of economical operation?" asked Mr. Graham, a member of the Committee. "In economical operation," Mr. Smith replied; "and it would reduce the actual cost." He added that he wanted to see the Government control by law the large unit. He later declared that he thought the best thing that could happen in Alaska would be the patenting of the Cunningham claims and passing them over to the Alaska Syndicate. Mr. Smith furthermore, under cross-examination, declared that he was anxious to safeguard the interests of the Geological Survey against unpopularity among the entrymen. He objected, therefore, to having representatives of the Geological Survey make quiet and secret investigation of entries to determine questions of good faith. With regard to withdrawals, Mr. Smith supported

the course of Secretary Ballinger. He went even further than Mr. Ballinger; for, while he reported the Secretary as saying that in the case of a question between a settler and a power site it was advisable to give the benefit of the doubt to the power site, Mr. Smith believed it would be better to give the benefit of the doubt to the settler, which would mean the sacrifice of public ownership in the power site. Moreover, Mr. Smith showed that he did not believe very heartily in the process of making large withdrawals for the purpose of making sure the retention of public ownership in power sites, and then "paring down," by admitting to private entry land that would not encroach on these sites. He agreed with Senator Sutherland that it was best to encourage the use of water power to the utmost extent, and he seemed inclined to think that the State should control water power, as it was the people of the State and not the Nation that needed protection in the matter of charges. Mr. Smith gave some testimony with regard to a report attributed to a Mr. Evans, as to a large number of acres, including power sites, that had fallen into private hands on account of Secretary Ballinger's restoration. Inasmuch, however, as Mr. Pinchot had already voluntarily declared that that report was erroneous, Mr. Smith's testimony at this point did not materially affect the investigation. Mr. Smith submitted a number of documentary complaints against employees of the Forest Service.

We clip from THE PRESIDENT'S AUTHORITY the New York "Tribune's" report of Mr. Taft's speech in Buffalo, Saturday evening, April 30, the following paragraph:

TO WITHDRAW

LANDS FROM SETTLEMENT

The President spoke of the Conservation bills in Congress, and especially the one confirming the right of the Executive to withdraw lands from public entry. "There has been objection to this," he said, " as a reflection upon those officials who already have exercised this power, in suggesting that they usurped the power of Congress. Speaking for one who has exercised that power himself, however, I want to say that I have not any objection to offer at all. If the Supreme Court should decide that this power does not exist, we would have a perfect

mess.

There are people who say the power does not exist and are trying to secure title to land on that ground. The fact that they are willing to face lawsuits shows they have a long purse and are prepared to fight." This doubt of the power of the Executive to withdraw lands from settlement appears to have been derived by Mr. Taft primarily from Mr. Ballinger. We judge this from Mr. Taft's letter to Mr. Garfield, November 24, 1909:

My Dear Mr. Garfield:

November 24, 1909.

Replying to your letter of November 6, I entirely agree with you that the difference between you and Mr. Ballinger is in your different conceptions of the power of the Secretary of the Interior to withdraw land from settlement, and it was Mr. Ballinger's fear that your orders of withdrawal were beyond the power of the Secretary of the Interior that led me to investigate the question and to concur with him in his view. When, however, he presented to me, as he did at the time that the order of revocation was made, or shortly after, the danger that water power sites might be taken up pending the action of Congress which was needed to treat them on the basis recommended by Mr. Roosevelt, I consented to a new order of withdrawal, provided the place of the water power sites was definitely fixed by the Geofogical Bureau, which had the best sources of information, as it turns out, in respect to the places where the sites were. I think it a considerable stretch of the Secretary's power, but I have been willing, in view of its previous exercise, to continue it with respect to more definitely ascertained water power sites, until I can bring the matter sharply to the attention of Congress.

These two semi-official statements put fairly before the reader the position of the present Administration on the question of the right of the Executive to withdraw lands from settlement without specific and direct authority from Congress. That position is, in brief, that the power is very doubtful, but that in case of necessity it may be temporarily exercised pending the determination of the question by Congress.

Buffalo in April, 1910, with his letter to Mr. Garfield in November, 1909, that Mr. Nelson's letter may have had some effect in modifying Mr. Taft's original opinion. We quote a single sentence from Senator Nelson's report:

The power of the President to reserve public lands from sale and entry rests upon various statutes and upon numerous decisions of the courts, and upon long-established and long-recognized usage.

This general declaration is supported by Senator Nelson by a variety of quotations from United States Statutes, Executive Acts, and decisions of the Federal Courts recognizing this authority in the President. From these quotations we quote one extract from a decision of the Supreme

Court of the United States:

From an early period in the history of the Government it has been the practice of the President to order, from time to time, as the emergencies of the public service required, parcels of land belonging to the United States to be reserved from sale and set apart for public uses. The authority of the President in this respect is recognized in numerous Acts of Congress.

We think that the Acts of Congress and the decisions of the courts referred to in this decision of the Supreme Court, and by Senator Nelson in his report, abundantly justify his conclusion "that the President of the United States has the inherent power to reserve for public purposes lands of the United States from location, sale, or entry." But as the present President entertains apparently some doubt of his authority, and as no man can be expected to exercise whole-heartedly a power concerning the lawfulness of which he has some doubt, we agree with Senator Nelson, with Mr. Garfield, and with Mr. Pinchot in hoping that Congress will pass, not an Act authorizing the President to exercise this power, but one declaring that he possesses it-the Senate bill recommended by the Senate Committee, which is declaratory simply: "That the President may at any time in his discretion withdraw from settlement, location, sale, or entry any of the public lands of the United States and reserve the same for forestry, water power sites, irrigation, classification of lands, or other public uses to be specified in the order of withdrawals," and report the same to Congress.

The Outlook agrees with President Taft, who, in his St. Louis speech, urged this policy on the Congress":

As concerns Congress at this time, Conservation resolves itself into the necessity of passing at once the bill which will give to the Executive unquestioned authority to withdraw lands for power sites and other purposes. With this power in the hands of the President, we can sit comfortably by and discuss and devise the best means of disposing of the great public domain for the benefit of present and future generations. Regulars, Insurgents, and Democrats should unite in passing at once the Senate bill declaring that the President possesses this power. The Congress can

then take up in more leisurely fashion the question what disposition shall be made of such lands, a question which it will be powerless even to consider if once the lands are taken up by private persons under existing laws.

SUBTRACTIONS FROM THE RAILWAY BILL

In the public interest, the laws regulating railways need amendment and expansion. Two subjects under this general head are traffic agreements and mergers. As to these the Republican Insurgents and Regulars in Congress seem at loggerheads. Last week, in both the Senate and the House of Representatives, a coalition of Insurgents and Democrats had its way with these Railway Bill subjects. In the Administration's bill, now pending in both houses, they eliminated the sections providing for traffic agreements and mergers. Traffic agreements by which two or more railway companies agree to maintain specified rates for the transportation both of passengers and freight are necessary if the complicated duties of our railways are to be successfully fulfilled. Despite the present law forbidding them, "gentlemen's agreements have persisted, and apparently cannot be prevented. Why should they be secret and surreptitious? Why not have them open and lawful and their terms filed with the Inter-State Commerce Commission? This has been favored by Presidents Roosevelt and Taft, was distinctly promised in the Republican party platform adopted nearly two years ago in Chicago, and found place in its Presidential candidate's speech of accept