calls for the widest legal research, and the success or failure of the case is largely dependent upon the ability with which it is handled in the Land Department.

REPAYMENT, APPEALS, ETC.

The act of June 16, 1880, and its amendments, provides for the repayment of money where entries have been erroneously allowed and can not be confirmed. To determine whether a claim for repayment should be allowed, it is necessary to consider the law under which the entry was made and ascertain whether it falls within the terms of the repayment act. During the last fiscal year there were stated 2,338 accounts, allowing repayment of $178,437.02, and during said period there were rejected 712 claims for repayment.

No extended mention can here be made of private land claims and special acts passed from time to time, or of a large variety of claims which incidentally arise in the Land Office, requiring the exercise of the judicial function.

In the exercise of its appellate jurisdiction during the last fiscal year, the General Land Office received and disposed of more than 7,000 cases, of which number more than 60 per cent of the decisions were final—that is, no appeal was taken from the action of the General Land Office to the Secretary of the Interior.

To enable the General Land Office to hear, consider, and decide, under an orderly procedure, the various matters confided to its judicial determination, rules of practice have been formulated. The attorneys practicing before the Land Department form a bar of specialists, learned in the law, the equal of any practicing before the courts.

As it exists now, the General Land Office, under an organization originally intended and equipped for executive duties alone, is required to perform judicial duties not often imposed upon a court of special jurisdiction.

SUMMARY AND RECOMMENDATION.

It is impossible for the commissioner and his assistant to pay the judicial attention to these cases which they should receive. The bar practicing before this office has very little opportunity to submit its cases directly to those who are by law responsible for the decisions, because of the multitudinous duties placed on these officers. The head of the office can not find time to give individual attention to many of the most important cases which are submitted for his consideration; he has too many duties to attend which he can not detail to others because he alone by law can perform them.

It necessarily follows, therefore, that:

(1) The commissioner is an executive officer having jurisdiction over as many diverse duties as any other bureau officer in the Gov

ernment, having directly under him at the present time some 2,000 employees.

(2) He is also a judicial officer, having the determination of cases great in number and of vast importance and over claims of great value, with one assistant commissioner.

As an executive officer the work over which he has jurisdiction is scattered over 103 land offices, 13 surveyors general, and 12 field divisions, with a force of some 500 employees localized in Washington, with a collection of, in round numbers, $10,000,000 a year and with the responsibility upon his shoulders of seeing that the work performed by this brigade of employees is properly. done. From the standpoint of work alone this is sufficient for one man to be responsible for, but in addition he must, with the assistant commissioner, individually assume responsibility for the text of the numerous decisions rendered by the General Land Office.

Of the 526 employees in this office, 131 are graduate lawyers, and in addition there are about 150 employees who by experience are qualified to pass on matters of a quasi-judicial character. In other words, there are over 280 men in this bureau who are passing upon matters which require either a general legal knowledge or expert knowledge in the interpretation of certain laws. It can easily be seen, therefore, that it would be impossible to transfer to any tribunal of the ordinary organization the matters which come before this bureau for judicial determination. There can be no removal of these cases from the jurisdiction of the Land Office. The intelligent way is to give to a board of law review greater powers, namely, authority to decide, as a judicial body, matters before the General Land Office, under the supervision of the commissioner an appeal lying to the Secretary of the Interior.

I recommend, therefore, the enactment of legislation under which there should be created the position of five members of a board of law review, who should be given original jurisdiction upon all cases written by the various law clerks of this bureau under which rights of claimants are determined, with the right of review in the commissioner and appeal to the Secretary. The two duties, executive and judicial, will in this way be more adequately taken care of, as they should be, and it would be possible for the work to receive from the heads a more careful consideration than it does now. The commissioner as an executive officer could give personal attention to many important details for which he is responsible to which he can give only brief attention at present, and by the creation of the positions of five members of a board of law review with original jurisdiction all cases which are submitted to this office could receive closer and more careful attention than they do at present.

SALARIES.

In connection with the organization and the changes which have been suggested, it is my duty to call attention to the inadequacy of the salaries paid to the higher employees of the General Land Office. The résumé of the character of the work to be performed, as set forth above, shows very plainly its importance, both in character and in results. One chief of division, namely, that of surveying division, receives $2,750; the chief clerk receives $2,500; the chief law clerk receives $2,500; one chief of division, $2,400; two members of the board of law review receive $2,200 and two $2,000 each. In addition to these there are only 27 employees receiving $2,000 each, only 37 receiving $1,800 each, and 69 receiving $1,600 each. There are employed in the General Land Office 131 men who are graduates in law, and it is of the greatest importance that this number should be increased and the vacancies in the office recruited from professional ranks in order that the work may be properly performed. It is evident, therefore, that not only are the higher grade employees underpaid but that, because of the inadequacy of the amount of salaries, there is not sufficient inducement to the right class of men to enter the General Land Office service. The policy is a poor one, and in my opinion the Government suffers very materially. True economy is in the paying of adequate salaries and in this way attracting to the service men who are energetic and thoroughly competent to do good work for the Government and by their force and ability save the Government money and perform its work properly and intelligently. I can not lay too great stress upon this matter. There should be places under the civil service in this bureau paying $4,000 per annum, $3,500, and $3,000 per annum, and the number of places from $1,600 to $2,000 should be increased. The ultimate effect of a step of this character would be greatly to the advantage of the Government.

COAL LEGISLATION.

In my report for last year the following statement was made:

It is imperative that new legislation be passed covering the disposition of coal lands in Alaska and in the United States. The inadequacy of the present laws is universally conceded. This proposition, therefore, needs no argument. The progress of advancement in the West is being retarded under present conditions by the difficulty in the successful opening of new mines under legislation as it exists to-day. Competition has been checked. The consumer is having to pay, therefore, a greater price than it would be reasonble to expect he would have to pay if it were possible to open new mines under legislation which would encourage the development of this resource. Legislation, however, which would not retain in the United States the right of supervision over the marketing of the product would be a mistake. To throw this resource open so that the coal deposits would ultimately pass into the hands of monopolies and trusts would be to render the conditions worse than they are at present. Congress, therefore,

should carefully guard the enactment of legislation and see to it that the requisite control is retained in the United States, so that a combination for the purpose of unjustly advancing prices can be checked through Government supervision.

The object to be obtained is the laying of this public necessity in the coal bins of the ultimate consumer at the cheapest possible price consonant with a due adherence to the principles of conservation.

Since the report was published no legislation has been enacted on this subject. There is as great necessity now as there was at the time of writing my last report for the enactment of legislation looking to the proper development of the coal fields of the West. A measure providing for the leasing of the lands under proper regulations seems to suggest the best means of meeting the situation, and it is to be hoped that Congress will enact some law along this line.

WATER POWERS.

The same general theory should govern the enactment of legislation on the disposition of rights in water powers, namely, a guardianship looking to the supplying of the public needs at the cheapest rates. There is no destruction of supply in the use of water power.

ALASKA.

During this year the office decided in cases regularly before it for adjudication the following important questions affecting the Alaska public coal lands:

(1) An agreement or understanding entered into between two or more persons that each person would enter and pay for 160 acres of Alaska coal lands and thereafter upon the acquisition of the title from the Government that all the parties would combine their claims into a single property for their common benefit was in contravention of the act of April 28, 1904 (33 Stat., 525), amending the Alaska coal land laws, and coal entries made pursuant to such an agreement and understanding were held for cancellation.

(2) Work done to ascertain merely the coal character of the land, and not with the intent to open and operate a mine, did not confer a preference right within the meaning of the act of April 28, 1904.

(3) The locator of a coal claim in Alaska must file notice of his location for record with the proper recording officer and also notice thereof with the register and receiver of the local land office within one year from the date of the location, and a failure to file for record such notice of location with the district recorder and also with the register and receiver within the year forfeits all rights under the location and requires the rejection of a subsequent application by the locator to enter the land.

(4) A location made and a declaratory statement filed for the land could not thereafter be changed upon the option of the locator;

an application for purchase presented by such person, who had made a prior location and without cause abandoned it, was held for rejection. While some of the questions above mentioned were not new in that the office had theretofore expressed an opinion thereon, they were all new in the sense that prior to the decision rendered during the present year none of the questions had been passed upon in a case regularly submitted for adjudication.

In a report made by the chief of the Alaskan field division on October 7, 1911 (time of writing this report), the total number of Alaska coal cases is given as 1,125; applications for patent filed, 521; notices of charges served, 172; answers to charges filed, 125; expiration notices served, 566; answers to expiration notices filed, 90; entries yet to be investigated as to good faith, 262. Up to July 1911, indictments returned in Alaskan criminal proceedings affecting coal lands covered 641 claims out of a total of 1,125 coal claims.

These particulars with reference to the Alaskan work are emphasized for the purpose of showing that there has been exceptional activity on the part of the agents in that field and a great deal of work accomplished by them. But notwithstanding this fact there still remains a great deal of work to be done in Alaska. Heretofore the reports have referred either to the Bering River coal field or the Matanuska coal field. Reports now coming in from the agents refer to (a) the Bering River coal fields, (b) the Matanuska coal field, (c) the Cook Inlet coal field, (d) the Alaska Peninsula coal field, (e) the Admiralty Island coal field, (f) the Nome district coal field, (g) the Fairbanks district coal field, (h) the Afognak Island coal field. It must be expected that a practically undeveloped territory, covering an area of over 500,000 square miles, will give rise to more work for the field service than that at present shown.

ALASKA LAW OFFICER.

The laws relating to public lands as applied to Alaska are acknowledgedly inadequate. Such as they are, however, they must be enforced. It is not the province of the General Land Office to legislate. The best way to call attention to the inadequacy of legislation is to enforce the law as it exists. With the amount of work which arises out of the number of applications for lands in Alaska, it has been deemed wise to designate an officer of the board of law review to whom all applications for lands in Alaska are referred, of whatsoever nature they may be. In this way it is hoped to obtain perfect uniformity in decisions and interpretation of the laws such as they are. The place should be permanently established by legislation with an adequate salary attached thereto.