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Show REPORT OF THE COMMISSIONER OF INDIAN AFFAIRS. 89 tant of any yet undertaken in the interest of the Indian. No other like number of Indians are so completely dependent upon water, yet ' nowhere are conditions less favorable than here. There is not enough water during the irrigation season for all the irrigable lands in the former reservation, but the most important storage site has been pre-empted under a reclamation project as a reservoir for a foreign water-shed. This arrangement undoubtedly means serious hardship not. only for the occupants of the Indian allotments, but for a good many white settlers besides. The Uintah systems must be completed in three years, which would be no inconsiderable task even were evei-7- thing favorable. The current Indian appropriation act (34 St,at. L., 375) carries the first installment, $125,000, of a total of $600>000 for this work, and the Congress has made the Secretary of the Interior a trustee to hold title to the systems until otherwise directed, empow-ered him to sue and be sued in regard thereto, and permitted anyone to use the ditches by complying with the laws of Utah. What this will lead to remains to be seen, but the only course left for the cus-todians of Indian interests is to make a diligent effort to put the water to use mithont delay. This Office is anxious to carry out the act. and will cooperate to the utmost, but a recent conference between representatives of the Indian Office and the supervising engineer developed the fact that very grave difficulties are to beovercome for the proper protection of the Indians, possibly demanding some amendment of existing law or an entrance upon tedious and expensive litigation. Wallcer River.-On the 25th of last July authority was granted to enlarge and extend ditch No. 2 on the Walker River Reservation, in Nevada, at a total cost of not to exceed $50,000. It is the intention of the Office to expend about $15,000 each year on this work. The super- I intendent of irrigation is now making the surveys in acordnnce with the suggestions of the chief engineer. Yakirna.-Irrigation on the Yakima Reservation took a new depar- .Lure with the act of March 6,1906 (34 Stat. L., 53), designed to bring the Indian lands within the scope of a reclamation scheme of great magnitude. The legislation was drawn to meet the views of the Geo-logical Survey, this Office concurring on the ground, first, that, In-dians shonld not. be permitted to defeat any plan of importance to the public interests at large unless it were plainly unjust to them-selves or in violation of good faith, and, second, that the outlook for dilatory litigation initiated in quarters hostile to the rights on whicb these Indians mere depending was too serious not to be reckoneE with. The purpose of the act of March 6 is to extinguish certain tribal claims and give the Indians in exchange individual rights apparently more substantial. |