th them
from the beginning as individuals with, I am sure, better results; but
any disposition of the public lands and any regulations relating to
timber and to the fisheries should have a kindly regard to their
interests. Having no power to levy taxes, the people of Alaska are
wholly dependent upon the General Government, to whose revenues the
seal fisheries make a large annual contribution. An appropriation for
education should neither be overlooked nor stinted.

The smallness of the population and the great distances between the
settlements offer serious obstacles to the establishment of the usual
Territorial form of government. Perhaps the organization of several
sub-districts with a small municipal council of limited powers for each
would be safe and useful.

Attention is called in this connection to the suggestions of the
Secretary of the Treasury relating to the establishment of another port
of entry in Alaska and of other needed customs facilities and
regulations.

In the administration of the land laws the policy of facilitating in
every proper way the adjustment of the honest claims of individual
settlers upon the public lands has been pursued. The number of pending
cases had during the preceding Administration been greatly increased
under the operation of orders for a time suspending final action in a
large part of the cases originating in the West and Northwest, and by
the subsequent use of unusual methods of examination. Only those who are
familiar with the conditions under which our agricultural lands have
been settled can appreciate the serious and often fatal consequences to
the settler of a policy that puts his title under suspicion or delays
the issuance of his patent. While care is taken to prevent and to expose
fraud, it should not be imputed without reason.

The manifest purpose of the homestead and preemption laws was to promote
the settlement of the public domain by persons having a _bona fide_
intent to make a home upon the selected lands. Where this intent is well
established and the requirements of the law have been substantially
complied with, the claimant is entitled to a prompt and friendly
consideration of his case; but where there is reason to believe that
the claimant is the mere agent of another who is seeking to evade a law
intended to promote small holdings and to secure by fraudulent methods
large tracts of timber and other lands, both principal and agent should
not only be thwar