within the period of two years from the passage and approval of this act shall be deemed and considered forever barred. Passed the House of Representatives May 12, 1914. SOUTH TRIMBLE, Clerk. The CHAIRMAN. The author of the bill is present, as are also a number of gentlemen representing persons interested in the measure. Mr. Aswell desires to be heard now. We will be very glad to hear from him. STATEMENT OF HON. JAMES B. ASWELL, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF LOUISIANA. Mr. ASWELL. Mr. Chairman, I will make a statement as to the history of this bill. This matter has been a very perplexing one in Louisiana for a great many years, particularly in the eighth district. Most of this land is located within the limits of my district. There are a few tracts across the line in Congressman Lazaro's district; but, so far as I am informed, it is practically all located in my own district, and that, of course, is why I am interested in having it settled. It has been a sore spot and an annoying thing for many years. I came to Washington several weeks before this Congress assembled, in March, 1913, and devoted a great deal of time to investigating the matter in order to reach a judgment as to the justice of it. I introduced this bill over a year ago. The Committee on Public Lands in the House referred the bill to the Department of the Interior, General Land Office, and received the report from the Land Office, which is printed in the hearings before the House Public Lands Committee. Later, early in this year, there were public hearings held before the Committee on Public Lands in the House, full and complete quite a volume of hearings. This is the printed copy of the hearings. Those hearings enabled all the interested parties to present their case fully and completely, and, I think, would give even this committee the facts in the case. After the hearings the Committee on Public Lands took it up for consideration for several days. That committee then referred the bill again to the Department of the Interior with a request that a substitute bill be written, or my original bill be rewritten in order to meet some of the objections given before the House committee, and to simplify it and make the bill easily workable. The Department of the Interior, or General Land Office, wrote a substitute bill, a new bill, and I accepted it and carried it back to the Committee on Public Lands in the House, and that committee discussed it for several hours and adopted it exactly as it came from the Land Office, with a word or two changed, but without any change in the meaning. So this bill that is before you now is—and I think I speak accurately when I say this-a department bill, written by the Land Office officials, indorsed by those officials, and enthusiastically supported by those officials. After the committee received this substitute and discussed it, as I said, fully, the Committee on the Public Lands recommended it favorably by unanimous vote. There are Democrats, Progressives, and Republicans, and one Independent on the committee, and there was not a vote against it. It was reported to the House by unanimous vote, as the report of the Committee on the Public Lands to the House will show. It naturally, when it reached the House, went on the Union Calendar, under the rules of the House. Taking advantage of the rules of the House, I had it put also on the Unanimous Consent Calendar of the House, as I was anxious to have action immediately take. Some gentlemen came in with amendments, and I urged that the matter be brought to action by the House at the earliest possible moment, and it remained on the Unanimous Consent Calendar for two months, just exactly, I think, two months. I tried to bring it up every time, and for one reason or another I could not get action. It was objected to once, and had but one more time to be objected to and it would go off the Unanimous Consent Calendar under the rules. Finally, I think it was the 12th of last month, I called it up on the floor of the House and it was passed by unanimous consent. That is a history of the bill. Every movement since over a year ago has been indorsed unanimously by the authorities that have had it in charge, and that is briefly the story of the bill. It comes to you written by the General Land Office, reported unanimously by the Public Lands Committee of the House, passed by unanimous consent on the floor of the House, and I think comes as strongly indorsed as a bill can come. I was informed that gentlemen opposing the bill wanted another bearing before this committee, and while I am perfectly willing to have this discussed and heard in every possible way, still I see nothing new that can be presented, for the reason that the objections urged then were largely met by this new bill by the General Land Office. There were at that hearing four gentlemen representing the settlers. This time there are two. They are here in the same manner they came before, by popular subscription. They have very little money, and they are here because they are interested in their homes. I ask you to hear them and act immediately upon the bill. The CHAIRMAN. I would like to ask you a question or two: Upon which side of the river do the lands involved in this legislation lie? Mr. ASWELL. Which river? The CHAIRMAN. The Mississippi River? Mr. ASWELL. All on the west side. The CHAIRMAN. All on the west side? Mr. ASWELL. Yes, sir; all on the west side. The CHAIRMAN. There is no question involved here, then, as to lands on the east side? Mr. ASWELL. None at all. The CHAIRMAN. Under the act of 1871 granting these lands to the railroad company, the New Orleans, Baton Rouge & Vicksburg Railroad Co., what were the reservations, if you can state them from memory, in the grant as to the rights of actual settlers? Mr. ASWELL. I can read it to you. Mr. CONSAUL. It appears at the top of page 19 of the hearings before the House Committee on the Public Lands, section 9 of the act of 1871, if I may interrupt. Mr. ASWELL. Read it, Mr. Consaul. The CHAIRMAN. All right, Mr. Consaul; go ahead. Mr. CONSAUL. I merely wish to call attention to the fact that that act of 1871 relates primarily and in general terms to the Texas Pacific Railroad Co. The Senators will find that act starting on page 17 of the House hearings, wherein it is set out in full. Mr. ASWELL. Read that. Mr. CONSAUL. Section 9 of that act, and especially that portion on page 19 of the House hearings The CHAIRMAN (interposing). Read the portion of it. What I want is the reservation in the grant relating to the rights of settlers on these lands. Mr. BERNSTEIN. There is no reservation in the act of 1871. Mr. HUDSON. Our contention, Mr. Chairman, is that there is absolutely no reservation in that act. Mr. CONSAUL. Would I be permitted to read that portion of the section? The CHAIRMAN. Perhaps we had better proceed and bring out the matters in due order; and if you do not bring it out, we will ask you concerning it. Senator STERLING. Might we not have a brief statement of the facts on which this bill is based? I have not had an opportunity to read this report. The CHAIRMAN. Yes; that is what we are going to do. Mr. ASWELL. Reading from section 9: In case any of said lands shall have been sold, reserved, occupied, or preempted, or otherwise disposed of, other lands shall be selected in lieu thereof by said company. Now, look at the act of 1887-and that bears directly upon that subject at page 22 of the hearings that were had before the House Public Lands Committee, you will notice the latter part of it reads: Provided, That all said lands occupied by actual settlers at the date of the definite location of said road and still remaining in their possession or in possession of their heirs or assigns shall be held and deemed excepted from said grant and shall be subject to entry under the public-land laws of the United States. Mr. BERNSTEIN. What are you reading from, Mr. Aswell? Mr. HUDSON. That is the act of 1887, and not the act the chairman refers to. The CHAIRMAN. Very well. of this legislation, and who is to us? Mr. HUNTER. I am. Now, who is familiar with the history prepared to present the history of it The CHAIRMAN. I have been through the record and have acquired some knowledge of it. All right, we will hear Col. Hunter. Mr. BERNSTEIN. Might I inquire simply whether or not this hearing will be a final hearing? I wish to present, for the interests that I represent, an application for a postponement, so far as we are concerned, of the hearings, as we are not in a position to conclude at this time. The CHAIRMAN. We will hear you when we reach you. Mr. BERNSTEIN. I just want to know if it is intended that this shall close the hearings? The CHAIRMAN. I can not tell you that now. We will see whether there is a necessity for it. We will hear from Col. Hunter. Mr. ASWELL. May I offer the suggestion to the committee that Judge Proudfit, representing the General Land Office, is here and will probably want to supplement my statement. The CHAIRMAN. Well, that is satisfactory. STATEMENT OF MR. S. V. PROUDFIT, LAW CLERK, GENERAL LAND OFFICE, WASHINGTON, D. C. Mr. PROUDFIT. My statement is intended simply to be a history of this bill through the department and things that led up to it, which are all included in the report that went out to the House committee. When the bill came by reference from the Department of the Interior to the Land Office it involved, necessarily, the examination of the history of the old grant in the department, and it was found that from the passage of the act of February 8, 1887, up until 1901, the adjustment of the exceptions in the grant made by section 2 of the act of February 8, 1887, were bing handled without any difficulty, but in 1901, the department was confronted with the provisions of the act of March 2, 1896, which limited the authority of the Government to bring suit to set aside patents that had been issued theretofore to a period of five years after the issuance of the patent. Thereupon the department held that in so far as patents had issued under the original grant, patents that were confirmed by the act of February 8, 1887, further adjustments would have to cease. Senator STERLING. You spoke of the original grant, Mr. Proudfit. To what orignial grant do you refer? Mr. PROUDFIT. I should have said the grant made by section 2 of the act of February 8, 1887, the confirmatory grant made to the New Orleans Pacific. Now, to go back a step, at the time the act of February 8, 1887 was enacted there were outstanding patents to the extent of about 675,000 acres that had been issued by the department to the New Orleans Pacific under the assignment made by the original grantee to the New Orleans Pacific. A question had arisen as to whether authority existed in the department to issue these patents without congressional approval of the transfer from one company to the other. The Attorney General had said that congressional approval of the transfer was not necessary, and after some time-a period of hesitation in the department-in March, 1885, these patents for this large acreage, 675,000 acres, were issued. Now, they were outstanding patents at the time the act of February 8, 1887, was enacted, and that is why I refer to it as a confirmatory act. That act relinquished all interests of the United States in those lands, and it confirmed in the company all rights under those patents with the exception that it protected the rights of actual settlers on the lands at the date of the definite location of the road. So that in 1901 the department, finding this act of 1896 put a limitation upon the right to bring a suit to set aside the patent, decided that it was no longer in a position to go forward with the adjustment of the grant, because of the oustanding patents which could not be set aside, and from that time to the present, there have been no adjustments of the rights under the act of 1887. This bill was addressed to that condition; it was to remedy that that the department made a favorable report on the proposition and ultimately submitted a draft of its own. Senator RANSDELL. Why have there been no attempts, Judge, from that time? Mr. PROUDFIT. For the reason that the Secretary of the Interior, or his legal advisers, always held the view that had been originally expressed in 1901, that the act of 1896 constituted a bar to any proceedings against outstanding patents. It was the view of the department then and has been up to the present time. When I say up to the present time, I mean so far as the decisions go. Senator RANSDELL. Has there been any change in the view of the department with regard to that? Mr. PROUDFIT. In the first report made on this bill the Secretary said that it might be and I am quoting now purely from memoryif one of these cases were now before him for consideration that he might take such action as would make a bill of this kind unnecessary. But he went on to say that he was confronted with the difficulty that arose from 13 years of a different holding, and that rights probably had grown up in the meantime, or might have done so, that ought to be considered; hence he said that, admitting it to be an error on the part of the department, he asked the aid of Congress to give him a free hand to go forward with the adjustment of the grant. That is about the substance of his position. Senator STERLING. The bill on its face purports to be a bill for the relief of settlers within the limits of the grant to this railroad ramed. Mr. PROUDFit. Yes. Senator STERLING. But after all is it not a bill really for the confirmation of the title of the railroad company, with the adjustment of the rights of settlers as an incident? Mr. PROUDFIT. Well, hardly that. It will ultimately result in settling the rights of the railroad company under the confirmatory grant to all those portions of the land to which settlers do not establish their claims. There is no doubt about that, none in the world. We intended to do that. But the primary purpose is to give these settlers who have lost their opportunity for a hearing another chance to be heard before the department. The CHAIRMAN. What is the relation of the act of March 3, 1871, to the subject matter of this proposed legislation? Mr. PROUDFIT. It does not come into consideration, for this reason, that the New Orleans Pacific, the people that are here to-day, are interested under the confirmatory grant of 1887, which made, really, a new grant; that is, under section 2, which provided that the outstanding patents should be confirmed with the exception of where there were settlers on the land at the date of the definite location of the road, and it also ratified the transfer. The CHAIRMAN. Were there any rights vested under the act of 1871? Mr. PROUDFIT. So far as I know, none. The CHAIRMAN. Did the act of 1887, which you say is germane to this consideration, repeal or modify expressly the act of 1871? Mr. PROUDFIT. In no way at all. The CHAIRMAN. So, in your view of the matter, it is not important to consider the act of 1871? Mr. PROUDFIT. No, sir. The CHAIRMAN. Now, the act of 1887, you have said, is confirmatory of the previous grant. What grant was that? Mr. PROUDFIT. No; not of a previous grant. It confirms the transfer between the original grantee and the New Orleans Pacific. |