stead laws, not only by the act of 1841, but also by the seventh section of the act of May 30, 1862, extending preemption rights to unsurveyed lands in California. Nevertheless, every person affected by a decision rendered should have an opportunity of being heard, and as it does not appear from the papers in this case that Mock was made aware of the proceedings in the Schofield application, you will see that such opportunity is extended to him as explained in the letter accompanying the patent.

Very respectfully,

Your obedient servant,

Jos. S WILSON, Commissioner.

Legality of Taxing Mining Claims while the title is in the United States.

DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR,

GENERAL LAND OFFICE, December 11, 1868. GEO. W. PROBASCO, ESQ., Shingle Springs, California: SIR: In reply to your letter of October 6, 1868, requesting the opinion of the Commissioner as to the legality of assessing and taxing mining claims, by the State authoriities while the title still remains in the United States, I have to reply that the question_submitted is one in reference to which this office has no duties to perform, and consequently has no authority to pass upon it in any shape. Very respectfully,

Jos. S. WILSON, Commissioner.

Assignment of Patents.

DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR,

GENERAL LAND OFFICE, January 21, 1869.

G. W. WARREN, Esq., 42 Court Street, Boston, Mass:

SIR: Referring to your letter of the 14th, you are informed that there are no regulations or rules governing the assignment of patents issued by this office. Such patents are deeds conveying to the grantees the title to certain land previously existing in the United States; and if these parties desire to transfer to others the title thus acquired, they must of course conform to the laws of the locus rei sito relating to the conveyance of realty.、

Very respectfully,

Jos. S. WILSON, Commissioner.

General Land Office cannot Supervise or Disregard Decisions of Courts.

DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR,

GENERAL LAND OFFICE, January 26, 1809. HON. A. A. SARGENT, 307 Delaware Av., Washington, D. C.: SIR: * * *It may be true, for aught that this office. knows to the contrary, that the Inimitable Co. lost its case in the California court, through its attorneys; but if so, the injury is one this office has no power to correct. It can neither supervise nor disregard the decisions rendered by such courts in cases of conflicting claims to the possession of mining property under the local customs, and until the Inimitable Co. can procure a reversal of the judgment against it in the case above referred to, no patent can be issued to it for the premises in controversy in the suit between it and the Union Copper Company.

Very respectfully,

Your obedient servant,

Jos. S. WILSON, Commissioner.

Circular Instructions Apply to all U. S. Mineral Lands. DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR,

GENERAL LAND OFFICE, January 28, 1869. Messrs. E. ALVORD & SON, Sandusky, Ohio:

GENTLEMEN: Referring to your letter of the 4th, inquiring whether circulars in relation to mining claims issued from this office apply to other than lands surveyed and returned as mining lands: you are informed that they apply to all lands the title of which is in the United States, whether surveyed or unsurveyed, containing either gold, silver, cinnabar, or copper, in quantities sufficient to lead to their development as mines, and bring them under the operation of the local mining customs of the respective mining districts.

Very respectfully, etc.,

Jos. S. WILSON, Commissioner.

Any Member of a Company may be Agent for all. Applicants for Patent must have the Local Possessory Right.

DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR,

GENERAL LAND OFFICE, January 28, 1869. Register and Receiver U. S. Land Office, Fairplay, Colorado: GENTLEMEN: * ** *He desires to know, First-whether one member of a mining company can file an adverse claim

in behalf of the whole, or whether each member must appear in person before the Register and Receiver, as he states has been required in your office. If the claimants are in fact associated as a company, their united interests constituting but one claim, patentable on the expenditure of but one thousand dollars in labor and improvements, there is no question as to the right of such company to appear by an authorized agent or attorney, and no reason appears why any one of the several members may not be thus authorized. This is the usual practice in other States and Territories, not only as to incorporated companies, but in respect to those not incorporated; and as the individuals composing these associations are often widely scattered, a different rule would frequently render proceedings under the mining act impracticable. Where the interest is of such a mutual character as it is in the case of these companies, there would seem to be no occasion for requiring the personal appearance at the local office of each individual of a company, and in adopting rules of practice, the convenience and ability of claimants should receive proper consideration, onerous and expensive regulations being seldom or never required in the administration of the public land system.

Second. Mr. Luttrell further inquires whether an applicant for a patent, having no possessory claim according to the mining laws and regulations of Colorado, can acquire title to a claim upon which he has made no improvements, and which, by the mining laws of the Territory, is in the peaceable possession of another, who, having failed to see the notices said to have been posted and published, made no appearance as an adverse claimant until after the expiration of the ninety days. He alleges, in respect to certain applications made before you, that if notices were posted at all, they were put on the premises at the time of a deep snow, while work in the mines was suspended and the miners absent at their respective homes, the ninety days expiring before the resumption of mining operations; that the description, in the newspaper notices, referred to stakes and other objects of such a local character that no one could tell by reading them what claims they embraced; and that the use of the compass and chain was at the time impracticable, on account of the snow on the mountains.

The mining act authorizes applications for patents by persons having previously occupied and improved their claims, according to the local customs and rules of miners in the district where the same are situated, and who have expended in actual labor and improvements thereon an amount of not less than one thousand dollars on each claim, and such claimants are authorized to include in their appli

cations only those claims to which they have possessory titles, under and by virtue of such local customs, and they have no right to include premises to which no such possessory rights attach. Persons having no possessory rights, according to the mining laws and regulations of Colorado, and who have not made the improvements required by the mining act, are not authorized to apply for patents, and the attempt to do so is a fraud, not only against the rightful owners, but against the policy of the act itself.

Very respectfully, etc.,

* * *

Jos. S. WILSON, Commissioner.

Patented Ground is subject to Entry by Adjoining

Proprietors.

DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR,

GENERAL LAND OFFICE, July 22, 1869.

Register and Receiver, Sacramento, California:

GENTLEMEN: This office has had under examination the application for patent by the Idaho Company for 3,100 feet of the Eureka Ledge, Nevada County, California, to which objection has been made on the part of the Schofield Company, on the ground of a possible identity as to the location in part of the "Eureka" and "Schofield" ledges.

Upon examination, it is found that the 3,100 feet of the Eureka ledge, claimed by the Idaho Company were located nearly four years prior to the discovery and location of the Schofield claim; and, as the latter company has already received a patent for as great a number of feet on the Schofield ledge as our construction of the local and United States mining laws will permit them to take, it is not seen in what manner they can be injured by the patenting of the Eureka ledge to the Idaho Company, granting them "the right to follow said vein or lode, with its dips, angles, and variations, to any depth," etc., as expressed in our mining patents. The patent issued to said Schofield Company, dated the tenth October, 1868, expressly providing by its first condition, that "the premises hereby conveyed are subject to be entered, and are hereby expressly made subject to such entry by any adjoining proprietors of a vein or lode of gold, silver, cinnabar, or copper, in exploring or operating such vein or lode, etc."

It is therefore decided that a patent should issue to said Idaho Company for their claim (to which they have proven to hold the possessory right) of 3,100 linear feet along the Eureka lode, as applied for; and you will so notify all parties in interest, giving the adverse parties thirty days.

from date of receipt of notice to appeal from this decision to the Secretary of the Interior.

Very respectfully, etc.,

Jos. S. WILSON, Commissioner.

Sulphur Springs are not regarded as Saline or Mineral.

DAPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR,

GENERAL LAND ORFICE, August 25, 1869. Register and Receiver, Fairplay, Colorado Territory:

GENTLEMEN: The testimony shows that no mines of gold, silver, cinnabar, or copper, exist upon this land, but that a sulphur spring is situated thereon. This office does not regard sulphur springs as saline or mineral, so as to come within the inhibition of the statutes excluding mineral and saline lands from pre-emption entry or scrip location.

Respectfully, etc.,

Jos. S. WILSON, Commissioner.

Applicants for Different Lodes may be made Adverse Claimants to each other.

DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR,

GENERAL LAND OFFICE, Sept, 21, 1869.

Register and Receiver, Central City, Colorado:

GENTLEMEN: It appears from an affidavit of Harvey B. Morse, dated June 26, 1869, on file in this office that on the 9th July, 1868, he applied for a patent in your office for the Ajax, or Big Indian lode, that he had the notice and diagram posted on the claim, and that the Register made the publication required by law; that on the 21st day of August following, James Burrell applied for patent for the Burrell lode in the vicinity of the Ajax, posting and publishing notices and diagrams as required; that on the 8th October next ensuing, said Burrell filed an adverse claim to the Ajax lode, claiming that it and the Burrell lode are one and the same.

On the 17th May, 1869, you forwarded the papers in the Burrell application indorsing the proof as satisfactory. The papers in the application of the Ajax, or Big Indian lode, although prior in date to the Burrell application, have not been forwarded to this office, the reason for which is supposed to be the filing of an adverse claim by Burrell, as no other is known.

But you will readily perceive that, if Burrell makes himself an adverse claimant to Morse, he, by the same process, makes Morse an adverse claimant to himself, inasmuch as