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Show 632 HISTORY OF PUBLIC LAND LAW DEVELOPMENT Expenses and Receipts on BLM Grazing Lands for 1933a Admin, of Grazing Lands____________$3,353,475 Fire Suppression___________________ 653,884 Soil and Moisture Conservation_______6,345,418 Weed Control_____________________ 894,196 Proportion Share for General Admin___ 515,846 Total__________________________11,762,819 Grazing Receipts___________________2,780,252 Appropriated for Payments to States.. 438,447 Appropriated for Range Improvements 696,525 Net to the United States___________ 1,645,280 • Hearings before the subcommittee on Public Lands of the Committee on Interior and Insular Affairs, United States Senate, 88th Cong., 1st sess., on Review of the Taj/lor Grazing Act, Part 2, p. 429. Yet the difference seemed very large, particularly when the BLM fee of 19 cents was compared with the 60 cents charged by the Forest Service, $1.25 by the Indian Bureau, and $3 by some private owners.67 All western states charged for their grazing lands fees that ranged from 300 percent to 1,875 percent higher than the BLM fees in the same states.68 A subcommittee of the Senate Interior and Insular Affairs Committee held a 3-day hearing in Reno on the proposal to increase the grazing fees of the BLM. There were present 124 Nevada ranchers and others representing the livestock industry of that state and a sprinkling of spokesmen from other range states who testified with unanimity against an increase. Representatives of conservation groups and of the Department of the Interior supported an increase and some of the former protested against the same dreary testimony which livestock-men had spread on the hearings for years, justifying their unwillingness to pay as much for the use of the public range as other livestock people were being asked to pay in the national forests, on state and privately owned lands.60 Secretary Udall, who was quoted as saying that the fee ques- "Ibid., p. 431. " Ibid., p. 403. "Ibid., pp. 931 ff. tion was "studied to exhaustion," and who had postponed an increase in 1962, felt that the decision could not be delayed further. The fee was increased from 19 cents to 30 cents and at the same time the allocation of income from fees for range improvements was increased from 25 percent to 33>/3 percent.70 An important factor in the decision was the multiple-purpose concept in range management. The fate of the lands was no longer to be determined by a single economic group. Summary of Grazing Operations on the Public Lands A summary of the grazing operations under the jurisdiction of the Bureau of Land Management as of 1966 illustrates how extensively its policies apply to the Intermountain and West Coast States. A total of 155,382,386 acres of federally owned lands are included within the grazing districts, of which 138,614,140 acres are public lands and the balance are reserved or withdrawn lands. In addition 18,436,978 acres of public lands are leased under Section 15 of the Taylor Act which authorized the leasing of lands not suitable because of location for inclusion in grazing districts. Income from both leases and permits came to $4,665,895 in 1966. Regular permits were issued to 17,820 persons; free use permits, crossing permits, and exchange of use permits were also issued. The Federal grazing districts supported 2,650,081 cattle and horses, and 6,021,592 sheep. In addition, on leased Federal land 8,198 operators grazed 1,225,218 cattle and horses and 1,910,031 sheep. Many people in the stock raising and heavily forested parts of the western states have continued to maintain that the phrase 70 Secretary of the Interior, Annual Report, 1933, p. 66. Following are the fluctuations in the fee from 1936 when it started at 5fl per animal month: 1937, 8t; 1950, \2i; 1958, 19ff; 1959, 22^; 1961, 19^. |
