Once again I call your attention to the condition of the public land laws.  Recent developments have given new urgency to the need for such changes as will fit these laws to actual present conditions.  The honest disposal and right use of the remaining public lands is of fundamental importance.  The iniquitous methods by which the monopolizing of the public lands is being brought about under the present laws are becoming more generally known, but the existing laws do not furnish effective remedies.  The recommendations of the Public Lands Commission upon this subject are wise and should be given effect.

The creation of small irrigated farms under the Reclamation act is a powerful offset to the tendency of certain other laws to foster or permit monopoly of the land.  Under that act the construction of great irrigation works has been proceeding rapidly and successfully, the lands reclaimed are eagerly taken up, and the prospect that the policy of National irrigation will accomplish all that was expected of it is bright.  The act should be extended to include the State of Texas.

The Reclamation act derives much of its value from the fact that it tends to secure the greatest possible number of homes on the land, and to create communities of freeholders, in part by settlement on public lands, in part by forcing the subdivision of large private holdings before they can get water from Government irrigation works.  The law requires that no right to the use of water for land in private ownership shall be sold for a tract exceeding 160 acres to any one land owner.  This provision has excited active and powerful hostility, but the success of the law itself depends on the wise and firm enforcement of it.  We cannot afford to substitute tenants for freeholders on the public domain.

The greater part of the remaining public lands can not be irrigated.  They are at present and will probably always be of greater value for grazing than for any other purpose.  This fact has led to the grazing homestead of 640 acres in Nebraska and to the proposed extension of it to other States.  It is argued that a family can not be supported on 160 acres of arid grazing land.  This is obviously true, but neither can a family be supported on 640 acres of much of the land to which it is proposed to apply the grazing homestead.  To establish universally any such arbitrary limit would be unwise at the present time.  It would probably result on the one hand in enlarging the holdings of some of the great land owners, and on the other in needless suffering and failure on the part of a very considerable proportion of the bona fide settlers who give faith to the implied assurance of the Government that such an area is sufficient.  The best use of the public grazing lands requires the careful examination and classification of these lands in order to give each settler land enough to support his family and no more.  While this work is being done, and until the lands are settled, the Government should take control of the open range, under reasonable regulations suited to local needs, following the general policy already in successful operation on the forest reserves.  It is probable that the present grazing value of the open public range is scarcely more than half what it once was or what it might easily be again under careful regulation.