Mining Rights ON THE PUBLIC DOMAIN Lode and Placer Claims TUNNELS, MILL SITES Statutes, Decisions, Forms and Land FOR PROSPECTORS, ATTORNEYS, SURVEYORS BY R. S. MORRISON AND EMILIO D. DE SOTO 13TH EDITION REVISED AND ENLARGED Denver, Colorado The Smith-Brooks Printing Company 1908 MINING RIGHTS DISTRICT RULES. The origin of Mining Districts and of their Rules was in the mining camps of California, in 1849, before any territorial form of government had been established, and the same system was followed and prevailed wherever valuable discoveries in other sections induced an influx of prospectors. Practically all the Pacific slope and the land east of the mountains to the Missouri river was then public domain. The vast ore bodies of the Comstock, the wealth of Alder Gulch, the veins and placers of Pike's Peak, and of countless intermediate mineral localities were all appropriated and their values extracted under the protection of this form of local self-government for many years, with no paternal interference by the National Legislature. Each local camp called itself a Mining District as defined by the action of a mass meeting of the miners. Some of them were less than a mile square, others quite extensive, and they have become permanent geographical divisions for purpose of description in the conveyance of real estate of all kinds in the mining counties. After defining the name and local extent of the District these meetings usually designated certain officials to be elected from time to time, and CONTRACTIONS. A. C.-Act of Congress. F.-Federal Reporter. L. D.-Land Decisions of the Interior Department. R. S.-Revised Statutes of the United States. R. S. Colo.-Revised Statutes of Colorado (1908). |