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NAVAL EXPENDITURES.

[From the Nautical Gazette.]

Certain grumblers in the session of Congress just closed complained of the increased expenditures necessary to give us a navy worthy of the position of our nation in the affairs of the world, and of our growing foreign commerce. Let us see, for the four years 1900-1903, how our naval expenditures, maintenance, and new ships compare with the expenditure for similar purposes by our four most important commercial rivals-Great Britain, Germany, France, and Russia.

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Averaging these four years we get the following result, in

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Is there any reason why we should not take as much care of our world position and our world trade, as does Great Britain. while, as a matter of fact, our exports exceed those of our TransAtlantic cousins? Instead of crying out that we are spending too much on our navy, these grumblers (for party purposes) should call for larger expenditures, or, at least keep quiet. Great Britain, with a smaller export trade, is devoting more than two and a half times as much money to the support and upbuilding of her navy as is the United States.

DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR.

The Land Fraud Investigation.

Information that frauds of a serious nature were being perpetrated against the Government by a combination of land speculators located at San Francisco, California, was brought to the attention of the Secretary of the Interior about December, 1902, through a report of one of the agents of the land department. Some of the persons implicated were represented to be men of wealth, of apparent high standing in their business relations, and of great social and political influence. It was charged that these men were defrauding the United States out of large quantities of the public lands by obtaining the same in an unlawful manner under certain provisions of the forest reserve legislation contained in the act of Congress of June 4, 1897 (30 Stat. 11, 34-36), the purpose of which legislation was to allow the exchange of lands held in private ownership within the limits of United States forest reserves for other lands belonging to the United States, situated outside of such reserves. By the creation of forest reserves many private owners of land within the boundaries thereof were placed in a state of isolation from the markets and business centers, and from church, school, and social advantages, and the value of their lands was thereby necessarily impaired. There was no longer hope of the continuing and increasing settlement of the surrounding lands, such as was reasonably expected and anticipated when their titles were acquired.

It was with a view to relieving the situation thus described with respect to the pioneer settlers of the public domain, and to provide a means whereby the Government might become the sole owner of all the lands within such reserves, and thereby be enabled to improve and protect the forests therein for the purpose of securing conditions favorable to a continuous water flow and to a permanent supply of timber for the use and necessities of the citizens of the United States, that the legislation referred to was enacted.

The information touching the alleged fradulent transactions tended strongly to show that this legislation, enacted in the interest of the public and for the most laudable purposes, was being perverted to the unlawful use of unscrupulous and scheming men, whose sole object was to increase their own possessions by defrauding the Government of its public lands.

The Secretary of the Interior at once placed the matter in the hands of competent agents, with instructions to make a most thorough and exhaustive investigation thereof and to probe every clue to wrongdoing to the bottom, regardless of any influence, social, political, or otherwise, that might be possessed by the parties implicated. The investigation was commenced early in January, 1903, and notwithstanding many great and almost insurmountable difficulties which had to be met and overcome, and the constant efforts on behalf of the persons involved to defeat the investigation and to control its issue favorably to themselves, the work proceeded without cessation, under the personal direction of the Secretary of the Interior, with the result that in February last Frederick A. Hyde and John A. Benson, of San Francisco, California, the leading spirits in the combination, together with others implicated with them, were indicted by the grand jury of the District of Columbia, under section 5440 of the Revised Statutes, for conspiracy to defraud the United States. The evidence procured in the investigation showed that these parties had been engaged for several years in securing and attempting to secure titles to and the possession and use of large tracts of the public lands of the United States in exchange for State school lands lying within the limits of United States forest reserves in the States of California and Oregon, the titles to which school lands were acquired by said parties from said States contrary to the laws thereof relating to the disposal of school lands, and in a grossly illegal and fraudulent manner, by means of false and forged affidavits and other documents required by the laws of said States to be executed

and filed in connection with the purchase of school lands; and also by making, and securing to be made, false and forged relinquishments to the United States of the lands thus fraudulently obtained from said States, and by selecting other lands belonging to the United States outside of forest reserves in lieu of the lands so fraudulently obtained and relinquished to the United States.

While several hundred thousand acres of the public lands, situated in various of the public land States and in the Territories of Arizona and New Mexico, are involved, only about thirty or forty thousand acres had been patented by the Government when the fraud was discovered. The issue of patents for such lands was immediately stopped, and the Government is therefore in no danger of further loss of its public lands through the said fraudulent scheme.

As a further result of the investigation John A. Benson has been indicted for bribery of public officials at Washington in connection with these fraudulent transactions.

The indictments, both for the conspiracy and for the bribery, are now being prosecuted with the utmost possible vigor by the Department of Justice. Immediately after the indictments were found the defendants were arrested-two in the State of California, one in the State of New York, and another in the District of Columbia. Proceedings under Section 1014 of the Revised Statutes have been instituted in California and New York to secure the removal of the defendants arrested in those States to the District of Columbia for trial.

The investigation and prosecution have had the effect to convince the publie mind that the Secretary of the Interior, as the head of the land department, is determined to guard the interests of the people with the greatest care and watchfulness in the matter of the disposal of the public lands, and to preserve the same for the benefit of those entitled to them under the law; and also to show that the Government is determined to punish all persons who seek to acquire its public lands by means of forgery, pérjury, bribery, or other unlawful means.

The Attorney-General has taken hold of the prosecution with vigor and determination, and the people need have no fear that any of the guilty parties will be allowed to escape just punishment for their misdeeds. That the results accomplished will have a beneficial effect in deterring others from entering upon similar fraudulent pràctices there can be no doubt, nor can the full extent of the good done be at this time estimated.

A copy of the indictment, the first count whereof describes in detail the fraudulent methods employed by the conspirators, is herewith submitted.

Frauds of a much less serious nature and extent have also been perpetrated in the States of California, Oregon, and Washington by other parties in attempts to secure title to timber lands belonging to the United States, under legislation enacted for the disposal of such lands. (Act June 3, 1878, 20 Stat. 89.) A number of indictments have been found against the parties engaged in these frauds, and the cases are now being pressed for trial in the courts, with the confident expectation that convictions will be had.

Care of the Indians.

The civilization of the American Indian is being accomplished through educational processes which have been wonderfully developed during the past seven years. A continuous policy has been pursued, and results are commensurate with the time, thought, and money which have been expended. Education to work has been the dominant factor. Literary training has been given the subordinate place. All Indian schools have been made industrial centers from which are annually radiating educated Indian boys and girls. They return in a great many instances to their reservation homes and allotments carrying the seeds of industry and thrift, which are beginning to bear fruit. Seven years ago 89,000 Indians out of a total of 183,000 dressed as citizens, while to-day 112,000 are thus habited. Then there were 38,000 who could read, and now there are 50,000, and 66,000 who have sufficient knowledge of the language to use it familiarly in ordinary business life.

There were conducted in 1897 234 schools, with an enrollment of 23,000 pupils, and to-day there are close to 30,000 whose names

are on the school rolls. They are taught by 2,500 teachers and instructors.

In no phase of the Indian question has greater progress been made than in the education of Indian children. Careful instruction adapted to future environment is taught in 257 schools which a generous Government has provided for its wards. These establishments are on the collossal scale of Haskell and Chilocco, with seven or eight hundred bright Indian boys and girls as assiduously pursuing their studies as their white friends, or on the modest plane of a little day school of twenty-five pupils, tucked away in a mountain gulch on an Indian reservation far from railroad and civilization. Each is working out the destiny of the Indian.

All the energies of the administration have been to civilize the Indian-to prepare him for citizenship and enlarge his capacity to enjoy its blessings. Indian schools are laying the broad foundation for this result, and unnumbered individual instances are produced showing that the American Indian is fast adapting himself to the manners, customs, and habits of the whites. The educated Indian as a citizen and a voter, as a farmer and a worker, is reaching the standard of the average citizen of our country. Reservation barriers are being broken down, and the great tide of civilization is sweeping into and around the lands of the Red Man. Modest as well as splendid homes and cities are springing up on the old reservations. The Indian is thus brought in contact and, after education, into a portion of that civilization. Business administration of schools and agencies has been substituted for the haphazard policies of the past. Men of education, experience, and business qualifications now control the destinies of the agencies and schools. These men are directing the energies of returned Indian pupils, and as a result ignorance, thriftlessness, and their attendant evils are being banished. Civilized homes and contented citizens can be the only result.

The education of the Indian costs about four million dollars per annum. It is money well spent, in that it is uplifting a race of native-born people to the high grade of citizens. It is annually sending back among the whilom warriors, bucks, and squaws of the older generation 2,000 or more educated, civilized youths to leaven the old mass, to break down tribal customs, and build up a sturdy yeomanry. It is dotting the West with deserted army posts, costing millions to build, equip, and maintain, turning barracks into dormitories, and cannon into plow shares. The rattle of the saber and the clank of war have given way to the busy hum of the shops and the cheerful call of the red plow boy, and instead of sending out a dashing troop to carry desolation and carnage to the Indian home, now emerges the educated Indian to take his place in our civilization as a wage-earner and peaceful worker in the shops and on the farm.

During the past four years the Government has been engaged in settling the affairs of the Five Civilized Tribes in Indian Territory, under agreements with the several tribes and legislation by Congress. This necessitated the resurvey, appraisement, and classification of nineteen and a half millions of acres, the largest estate ever settled in the history of the world, a Territory about the size of the State of Indiana, and an inquiry into the rights of two hundred and fifty thousand claimants to citizenship, resulting in favorable action on about one hundred and thirty thousand cases, allotments having been made to about two-thirds of these. Two hundred and ninety-seven towns have been surveyed and the lots appraised and scheduled preparatory to sale, and it is expected that at least five millions will be realized for the tribes. There being large tracts of coal lands in the Choctaw and Chickasaw Nations, four hundred and fifty thousand acres have been set aside and are soon to be sold for the benefit of the two tribes, the value being estimated at several millions. Many and far-reaching legal questions have been solved or are in process of solution in connection with this work, to the end that all the affairs of these tribes may be finally closed up when their governments expire by limitation of law in March, 1906, and their citizens become merged with the general citizenship of the Nation.

As a result of the recent laws relating to Oklahoma and Indian Territories there have been constructed in that section of country within the past four years about 2,000 miles of new railroad,

opening to market the resources of one of the most richly endowed portions of the United States, embracing extensive coal and asphalt fields; and nearly every town and hamlet in that broad region is connected by telephone with the surrounding States.

Since the first of October, 1901, over 2,000 allotments of lands in severalty have been made to Indians on various reservations in pursuance of the policy. of breaking up the reservation system. During the same time over 800,000 acres of reservation lands have been restored to the public domain and made subject to settlement and sale, providing homesteads for 5,000 families.

The further quantity of 2,300,000 acres of Indian reservation lands is to be disposed of within the next two or three years.

In the matter of the occupancy of Indian lands, a remarkable reform has been accomplished within the past few years. Only a few years ago Indian reservations were open to encroachment by the whites and were subject to continual trespassing. Now practically every acre of surplus tribal land is under lease, yielding the Indians of the several reservations a revenue of more than a million and a half dollars annually.

Under the act of 1902, authorizing the sale of lands of deceased Indians, the Department of the Interior has disposed of, at fair prices to the Indian heirs, about one thousand five hundred separate tracts, aggregating 150,000 acres, situated principally in the middle west, making 1,500 additional homes to meet the wants of our ever increasing population.

During the present administration no less than 15,000 leases of Indian allotments have been executed, and approved by the Secretary of the Interior, covering an area of about a million and a quarter acres, and yielding a revenue to individual Indians of something like $600,000 annually, and providing temporary homes for thousands of settlers.

Pensions.

In the administration of the pension laws, the Pension Bureau, under Republican administration, has always been liberal and generous to the brave defenders of our country. The Republican party has been the devoted and consistent friend of the soldier and his dependents, and this fact stands forth prominently in the history of pension legislation ever since 1862.

Liberal and beneficent laws have been enacted, and the present pension system, which has been built up by the different administrations, is the best and most liberal in the world. It embraces within its provisions the soldier and sailor who contracted his disabilities in the service, and grants relief to 450,000 survivors of the Civil War who are incapacitated for earning a support from causes which have arisen since the war. Besides these, nearly 300,000 widows and dependent relatives are receiving the benefits of the pension laws.

Notwithstanding the fact that the annual death rate of pensioners is about 45,000 per year, the allowance of new pensions each year are nearly sufficient to prevent any material decrease in the number of pensioners, and in the amount of the annual payments.

Starting with 126,722 pensioners in 1866, the roll has steadily increased under the beneficent legislation of Congress, and from July to October, 1902, the number of pensioners exceeded one million. There has been only a slight decrease since that date, and it would not be surprising if the roll should again exceed one million.

Since 1866 the total payments for pensions have been over $3,000,000,000, and the magnitude of the pension roll both as to the number of beneficiaries and the amount paid has excited the wonder and admiration of all the nations of the world.

The details of the pension system and pension legislation of the United States are discussed at length on page 403.

Our opponents now appeal for confidence on the ground that if triumphant they may be trusted to prove false to every principle which in the last eight years they have laid down as vital, and to leave undisturbed those very acts of the administration because of which they ask that the administration itself be driven from power. -President Roosevelt's speech accepting 1904 nomination.

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