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Show 760 HISTORY OF PUBLIC LAND LAW DEVELOPMENT sources for the Future, Inc., a president of the Colorado School of Mines, two attorneys in private practice in different parts of the country, a Harvard University economist, and a foreign investment counselor from Arizona. Their "interim" report was cautious.425 Although it was urged that the Federal oil shale policy should promote a competitive shale industry and encourage research in technology and the conservation problems which arise in connection with processing oil shale, still the board reached no consensus on the question of opening the Federal lands to private leasing. Individual members of the board presented their own views on the desirability of immediate leasing. Of these, the position of John Kenneth Galbraith, the Harvard University economist, has received the most attention.426 Essentially he recommends no leasing until government-sponsored research has revealed what sort of return the government might reasonably expect from leasing. Most of the others favored some degree of leasing as well as private research agreements. In May 1967,427 Secretary Udall issued rules relating to leasing and proposed regulations which implemented his five-point program to open up the federally owned oil shale, announced 4 months earlier. The program can be only briefly noted here, and what follows is a most over-simplified statement of what is being considered. After suggesting that title controversies be cleared as rapidly as possible, he advocated a program of private exchanges to pro- 424 An interesting account is Duscha, Bonanza in Colorado-Who Gets It? Atlantic Monthly 82 (March 1966), and Welles, Oil Shale: Hidden Scandal or Inflated Myth?, Harper's (August 1968). 425 Oil Shale Advisory Board, Interim Report (1965) . 428 Reprinted in 2 Land and Water L. Rev. 51 (1967). 427 32 Fed. Reg. 7086 (1967), proposed to amend 43 C.F.R., Subpart 3170 (1967) . mote the blocking up of known oil shale lands in private or Federal ownership. The objective is to consolidate in one form of ownership sufficiently large blocks to create an economic-sized unit. The Secretary also has proposed regulations for research and development contracts for a very small portion of the oil shale deposits, for joint Interior, AEC, and private in situ428 experiments, and for accelerated research by the Interior Department in technology and conservation practices and health safeguards. For the lawyer, the title controversies referred to above are of unusual interest.429 It will be remembered that prior to 1920, oil shale locations could be made under the Placer Law of 1897. Because of a minor oil shale boom after World War II, perhaps as many as 150,000 shale locations were made on the Federal land presently involved. The 1897 Act permitted the locator to obtain a patent, and it has been estimated that as much as one-fourth of the Federal oil shale lands have passed into private ownership in this manner. When oil shale became exclusively leasable after the Mineral Leasing Act of 1920, a few-very few-leases were issued in the 428 I.e., retorting the oil shale in place, a process which would eliminate the expense involved in transporting the shale to the retort where it decomposes into oil shale. 428 The two best general articles are Note, 19 Stan. L. Rev. 190 (1966) and Note, 51 Minn. L. Rev. 1154 (1967). See also Dominick, Oil Shale- The Need for a National Policy, 2 Land and Water L. Rev. 61 (1967) . For discussions of specific aspects of the oil shale question, see Anderson, Acquiring Rights to Minerals Associated With or Contained in Oil Shale, 13 Rocky Mt. Min. L. Inst. 233 (1967) ; Cameron, Current Problems in Oil Shale Development, 10 Rocky Mt. Min. L. Inst. 339 (1965) ; Delaney, Water for Oil Shale Development, 43 Denver L. J. 72 (1966) ; Miller, Impediments to Oil Shale Development, 35 U. Colo. L. Rev. 171 (1963) ; Reidy, Do Unpatented Oil Shale Mining Claims Exist? 43 Denver L. J. 9 (1966) ; Note, 3 Land and Water L. Rev. 75 (1968) (discussing the "reserved water" doctrine and its application to oil shale development) . |