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YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK.prospectors with whom I have conversed, that none will be found
within the limits of the park.
A few months before the passage of the act of March 1, 1872, creating the park,
several persons had located upon land at some of the points of greatest
interest, with a view to establish a squatters' right of pre-emption, and they
have since made application for such pre-emption of property, which embraces
some of the chief attractions of the locality. Certainly their settlement upon
these lands established no right of pre-emption or purchase in their favor. Any
expenditures they may have made were at their own risk, especially if made after
the passage of the act. A joint application of this kind from two of these
persons (appended hereunto and marked A) has been referred to me by the
Department. With no desire to impair any supposed rights these applicants may
have, and with no personal objection to them as tenants, I still feel it a duty
to recommend that their application be refused. To grant it would be to
establish a precedent which would open the door for scores of similar
applications, under which exhausting process the park would soon lose all its
distinctive features of nationality. No sales of property within its boundaries
should be made to anyone; but whenever, in good faith, improvements have been
made, with a view to future purchase or occupancy, such improvements should
either be purchased of the persons who made them, or received in payment of the
premises occupied by them, for such term as may, on full consideration, seem
just and equitable. The realty of the land should be held alone by the
Government, and be subject to such rules and regulations as may, from time to
time, be adopted by the Department of the Interior. Several improvements for
convenience of visitors had been made before the act of dedication was passed.
These should be acquired by the Government, by making adequate compensation to
the persons by whom they were erected, and these persons, if it should be their
choice, should have a preference, upon equal terms, over other applicants for
the rental of the premises they have improved.
The wild game of all kinds with which the park
abounds should be protected by law, and all hunting, trapping, and fishing
within its boundaries, except for purposes of recreation by visitors and
tourists, or for use by actual residents of the park, should be prohibited under
severe penalties. Laws prohibiting the cutting of timber, except in such
localities as may be prescribed by the superintendent, should be adopted.
It is especially recommended that a
law be passed, punishing, by fine and imprisonment, all persons who leave any
fire they may have made, for convenience or otherwise, unextinguished. Nearly
all extensive conflagrations of timber in the mountains may be directly traced
to negligence in extinguishing camp-fires. In the timber regions, these fires
are generally kindled against stumps and dry trunks of trees, by which, unless
carefully extinguished, they often, after many days, communicate with the
forest, and spread over immense tracts, destroying large quantities of valuable
timber. Nothing less than a stringent law punishing negligence and carelessness,
can save the extensive pine timber fields of the park from destruction.
As connected with this subject of
legislation I would also recommend that the park be attached to Gallatin County,
Montana, for judicial purposes, and that the laws of Montana be enforced within
its boundaries. In order to make this recommendation effectual I would
respectfully suggest that all the portion of the park not included in the
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