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Show __2__ would not restore them; that no loss could accrue to the Government or to any one, except possibly those who engage in the enterprise, from the attempted reclamation, with the possibility of reclaiming a vast area of now worthless, waste, arid, and desert lands. We therefore favor the passage of the bill. This measure has frequently been before Congress, and we believe has been several times favorably reported. The Committee on the Public Lands in the Forty-fifth Congress made quite an elaborate report, which we here quote and adopt. [House Report No. 380, Forty-fifth Congress, second session.] The Committee on the Public Lands, to whom was referred bill H. R. 1153, to encourage the introduction of a supply of fresh water on the desert west of Fort Yuma, having had the same under consideration, make the following report: The object contemplated by the bill is the introduction of fresh water on a body of land which was formerly the bed of a salt-water gulf, the Gulf of California, by which it is expected to clothe this arid plain with products beneficial to man, reducing the overheated atmosphere to a temperature which will permit its being inhabited by him and at the same time afford him the necessaries of life, and, with all, promoting our general welfare by the cultivation of such products as are in general demand. This measure was inaugurated by the present applicant some nineteen years since; having received the approval and co-operation of the legislature of California by the passage of a bill (1859) granting the State's interest in those lands, and at the same time passing a joint resolution instructing the Senators and Representatives of that State |