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Show 181 tivity of soil were insufficient to guide the states.182 From the start, settlers on many projects were in financial difficulties in connection with heavy mortgages executed for financing con- struction of irrigation works.183 A number of projects never- theless continued for some time to operate under the Carey Act.184 With respect to the foregoing federal statutes, it has been said that they failed to further in any substantial measure the Government's long-established policy of encouraging the set- tlement of arid public lands.185 Reclamation Law To this point, as we have seen, federal interest in irrigation was limited to providing for certain water uses and to permit- ting use of public lands on specified conditions. The statutes involved nevertheless foreshadowed passage of the 1902 Rec- lamation Act.186 And with its passage, Congress established irrigation in the West as a national policy.187 But while Rec- lamation projects are limited to the West, benefits are not lim- ited to public lands.188 Early cases sustained the 1902 Act as a proper exercise of the Government's proprietary power.189 Moreover, in speak- 1M Reclamation Handbook, Department of the Interior, Bureau of Rec- lamation, p. 22 (1942). ls>Ioid. 184 By 1930, only 17 Irrigation enterprises were so operated, covering 174,246 acres. Ibid. 1M See United States v. Hanson, 167 Fed. 881, 883 (0. A. 9,1909). 186 Act of June 17, 1902, 32 Stat. 388, 43 U. S. O. 391 et seq. Speaking of the earlier legislation, a Federal District Court in 1912 said, "By a series of acts and resolutions passed by Congress beginning as early as 1888 * * * the Government unmistakably declared a purpose to reclaim its arid lands by conducting water to and across them, and provision was shortly made to enable it to carry out that purpose." United States v. Van Horn, 197 Fed. 611, 615 (D. C. Colo., 1912). m Burley v. United States, 179 Fed. 1 (C. A. 9, 1910). "The policy of reclaiming the arid region of the West for a beneficial use open to all the people of the United States is as much a national policy as the preservation of rivers and harbors for the benefit of navigation." 179 Fed. at 11. *w See supra, p. 45. "• See supra, pp. 44-45. |