-
2: Local Mining District Regulations
- University of New Mexico Press
- Chapter
- Additional Information
16 chapter 2 Local Mining district regulations History repeats itself with a stutter. —Lawrence Ferlinghetti, “First, the news” in How to Paint Sunlight (2001) The Mining Law of 1872 has its origins in the California gold rush. Local mining district regulations formed the basis for congressional legislation and judicial inquiry. The national hysteria that drove thousands westward got down to earth when gold seekers assembled in a placer mining locality to write property rules governing their local district. in their worldview, the 1849 miners needed rules to define what constituted a claim and what the size of the claim should be, to require that the claim be recorded, and to define the limits of use of property. Miners were little concerned with the underlying title to the land they claimed. american indian title was not extinguished, spanish and Mexican title under grant was unclear, and whether California was public land by virtue of the Mexican War was not a concern. What concerned miners was their assertion of a property right in placer grounds against other miners during a mining rush. What they wanted was some sense of certainty in the ground they were working. This assertion of a claim of right in real property was nothing new in american history. english colonists rarely respected american indian title, and the spanish also took indian lands and enslaved the survivors of conquest. The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo had ended the Mexican War, but the impact of spanish or Mexican grant titles was unclear in 1849. argonauts, whether american emigrant or immigrant entrepreneur , claimed mineral lands unoccupied by another miner. information flowing back to Congress told of wealth, massive emigration, and a need Local Mining District Regulations / 17 for a mining law. Following american legal tradition for public lands, Congress wrote statutes granting preemption rights for those pioneers in the West. even more fundamentally, americans knew that property was liberty and liberty equaled private property. The american revolution was based on this protection of the ancient constitution of Britain and the assertion of the sanctity of private property.1 When Congress set out to write mining law for the California gold rush and the Comstock Lode in nevada, it had precedent. Congress legislated for mining in a variety of ways before the gold rush to California. in the General Land act of 1785 Congress reserved onethird of all gold, silver, lead, and copper in mines sold or otherwise disposed of under the act. in 1807 Congress inaugurated a leasing system for the lead mines of indiana Territory. in the 1840s leases extended to the Lake superior copper-mining lands. Under an act of March 3, 1829, the United states sold lead-mining tracts to the public. Land sales California placer miners at the head of the auburn ravine. Courtesy of the California History section, California state Library. [44.203.58.132] Project MUSE (2024-03-28 14:56 GMT) 18 / Chapter 2 extended to copper lands in 1847 including the Chippewa district in Wisconsin.2 Leases and sales guaranteed interests in land or the certainty of private property. Miners took a gamble, but they did not want to gamble on their rights to a particular piece of ground. This gambling context explains, in part, why Congress in 1872 did not impose a royalty fee on mining the public domain. Milton B. stevens wrote to his mother from salmon Falls, California, on december 9, 1849, that “we are making from 8 to 25 dolars per day. This is but small pickings.”3 Gordon C. Cone confided to his diary on February 12, 1850, that “gold digging in California is attended with great uncertainty. in the first place there is but few places that gold is found in anything like an aboundance, and there places have all been dug out.”4 stanford Johnson in new diggings, California, wrote to daniel Johnson on december 28, 1850, observing that “it is true one gits a fortune very quick but wher there is one that gits a fortune there is thousands that dont git anything at all.”5 The days of placer bonanzas in California passed quickly, and by the time Congress legislated in 1872, the nature of mining had changed. For the miners, the risk of the venture remained. The gambling nature of mining was not confined to California’s placers . enoch root wrote to his sister from Laurette, Colorado, on april 15, 1862, and reported that “times are very dull here at present.”6 Two weeks...