in the first instance appointed and then upon a full hearing the court confirmed the appointment, and from this appointment the matter has been taken to the Appellate Court." The consensus of opinion among the miners and citizens generally in Alaska is that the Federal mining laws should be revised. They hold that either a revision of the placer mining laws or authoritative decisions establishing certain manifest needs of the mining industry is imperative. For instance, it is contended that the right to locate mineral lands under power of attorney should be abolished; that the size of claims should be cut down; that the discovery of mineral should be prerequisite to a valid location, and that the section in the code authorizing the appointing of receivers should be repealed. The development of the resources of Alaska, or the much desired rapid progress in that direction, unquestionably depends, in no small measure, on the recognition of this fact. CHAPTER XXIX. GOVERNMENTAL CONSIDERATIONS RESIDENTS OF NATIONAL AUTHORITY AND INFLUENCE-RESIDENTS MENT. Long accustomed to machinery of government adapted to their needs, and taking as a matter of course the adjustment of the various parts to the subserving of their interests, the people of the States may well fail to appreciate how closely questions of national authority and influence touch the new communities of Alaska, now struggling in the first stages of development and striving to reach a condition of stability and security which is realized to be prerequisite to rational progress. The sovereignty of the general government touches them in all the relations of life. Only under its protection, now that the miners' regulations are superseded, will law and order flourish. In the ordinary relations of life in the States the national authority is very little felt or known, the States having reserved to themselves nearly all powers over such affairs of the people as concern the usual and everyday vocations; but in Alaska, the Federal government, having all the powers reserved as well as those delegated, reaches with its authority every resident, and the ramifications of its influence is unlimited. Nearly all of the people in Alaska have left homes in the States whose influences and environments daily. inculcated appreciation of the value of American institutions. They have taken with them the heritage of American history and the traditions of American patriotism. Having been all their lives accustomed to orderly forms and reasonably convenient public facili ties, they are solicitous for something of the same nature in their new home, and always breathing the air of jealous and independent regard for national honor, they may be excused if they seem restive and inclined. to resent that which may appear to them to be a departure from the traditions of the fathers. The inhabitants of Alaska are congregated in towns. and cities. Families are there who have made that land the home of their adoption. Intelligent, educated parents are there who appreciate what educational and other opportunities mean, and what the lack of them. may entail. Congress has provided means for taxing the people for the benefit of the national treasury, but thus far they have been left without power of legislating for themselves; without means to provide revenue for maintaining an autonomous form of government, which involves the important questions of providing police service, protection against fire, wholesome water supply, adequate school facilities, care of the sick and indigent, and the many other things necessary to the intellectual, moral and physical well being of the people, except in so far as the people themselves may contribute to these purposes and support them out of their private funds. As one congressman has said, they are taxed in a manner that no other part of the United States is taxed. The excise or license fee system is the form of taxation imposed. Incorporated towns have a limited power of taxation for local purposes, but unincorporated towns have, of course, no such authority. No distinction is made by the government between incorporated and unincorporated towns in respect to the collection of the license taxes. Recognizing the wisdom of having a portion of the moneys so raised go to local purposes, Congress has provided that fifty per cent of all license moneys collected shall be used for school purposes, but has unwisely restricted the benefits of this provision to incorporated towns, while in another part of the Code the power of incorporated towns to raise means for conducting their affairs is so limited as to make general incorporation of Alaskan communities out of the question. If the towns of the Territory could be conveniently incorporated, there would not be so much ground for complaint. But when the people examine into the conditions of such action on their part, they find among other things that the Code has so limited the power of incorporated towns to raise funds for carrying on local governmental affairs as to render incorporation a thing to be shunned, and they prefer to entrust the policing and protection of their towns to the military and to remain under military rule rather than under a local municipal government without means to support itself. The one per centum limitation imposed by Section 198, of the present Code, upon the authority of incorporated towns to tax for general purposes, is therefore one of the things that prevent general incorporation, and as a consequence the provision requiring one-half of the amount raised from the license fees to be devoted to local purposes, is practically a nullity. Nome, for example, a city with a population of 15,000, comprising a large proportion of the total white population of Alaska, is not incorporated, and it is not likely to be under the present law. The city receives, therefore, no part of the moneys accruing from the taxation of her business enterprises and property. As a result, the city of Nome, while paying to the government annually more than $80,000 in this form of revenue, is required to support her schools, as well as her other public facilities, almost wholly by local subscription and the personal contribution of the residents, while the few incorporated towns, having a combined population not to exceed 6,000, receive aid to the extent of fifty per cent of all license taxes collected. The complaint is not that the few incorporated towns receive this aid, but that the system is wholly inadequate to the needs of these new and rapidly growing communities. As stated before, unincorporated towns are taxed by the government equally with the incorporated, but the former is allowed no proportion of the funds collected for the promotion of important public services. The unfairness of this provision, considering the present barriers to incorporation, is apparent to every resident of the Territory. Strenuous efforts on the part of influential residents have but recently been made to bring to the attention. of Congress, and the Executive at Washington, some of the urgent needs of the Territory, and to induce some action to supply them, but they have met with no adequate results. Through the rush and confusion of conflicting interests, and the turmoil of party politics at the national capital, during a session of Congress, it is fortunate if even a ray of governmental sunlight bursts to brighten the far away shores of Alaska. A people 6,000 miles distant from the seat of authority, |