In view of the fact that all recent legislation of Congress has been in the direction of subdividing judicial districts and of bringing the United States courts nearer to the litigants, I can only attribute to oversight the passage of this bill, which in my opinion would burden the homesteader and preemptor whose claim is contested, whether by another individual or by any corporation, by compelling him to appear at Washington and to conduct with the formality and expense incident to court proceedings the defense of his title.  But even in the case of land contests arising in the States where district courts exist the plaintiff, it will be observed, by this act is given the option to sue in those courts or to bring his adversary to Washington to litigate the claim.  Why should he have this advantage, one that is not given so far as I know in any other law fixing the forum of litigation between individuals?  Not only is this true, but the Court of Claims was established for the trial of cases between individuals and corporations on the one side and the United States on the other, and so far as I now recall wholly for the trial of money claims.

There are no adequate provisions of law, if any at all, for conducting suits between individuals contesting private rights.  The court has one bailiff and one messenger, no marshal, and is not provided, I think, either with the machinery or with the appropriation to send its processes to the most distant parts of the country.  Yet it is apparent that under this bill the real issue would frequently be between rival claimants, and not between either and the United States.  This court, too, is already burdened with business since the reference to it of the Indian depredation claims, the French spoliation claims, etc., and it certainly can not be thought that a more speedy settlement of land claims could be there obtained than is now given.

Again, the bill is so indefinite in its provisions that it can not be told, I think, what function, if any, remains to be discharged by the General Land Office.  It was said in answer to an interrogatory when the bill was under consideration that it did not affect claims pending in the Land Office; and yet it seems to me that its effect is to allow any contestant in the Land Office at any stage of the proceedings there to transfer the whole controversy to the courts.  He may take his chances of success in the Land Office, and if at any time he becomes apprehensive of an adverse decision he may begin de novo in the courts.

If it was intended to preserve the jurisdiction of the Land Office and to hold cases there until a judgment had been reached, the bill should have so provided, for it is capable of, and indeed seems to me compels, the construction that either party may forsake the Land Office at any stage of a contest.  I am quite inclined to believe that if provision were made, as in section 1063 of the Revised Statutes, relating to claims in other departments, for the transfer to a proper court, under proper regulations, of certain contest cases involving questions affecting large classes of claims, it would be a relief to the Land Office and would tend to a more speedy adjustment of land titles in such cases, a result which would be in the interest of all our people.