OCR Text |
Show Com'r mdian Aff3. -2- pursuant to the joint resolution of June 19, 1902 (32 Stat., 744), and the general allotment act of February 8, 1887 (24 Stat.,388), and the acts amendatory thereof and supplemental thereto. Your communication sets forth that The n_att9r is submitted at this time with a view of asking wher3 the title to tha minerals in this land rests, and whether, in view of tha provisions quotad in the act of June 7, 1397, supra, the patent heretofore issued to thi3 Indian, is not in effect, a patent for tha "surface rights only." Said act of June 7, 1897, among other things, specifically provides that: "The title to all of tha said lands containing gilsonite, asphaltum, elaterite, or like substances is reserved to the United States." For the purpose of enabling the Secretary of the Interior to correct certain erroneous trust patents on Indian allotments, the act of January 25, 1395 (28 Stat., 641), was passed. Said act was amended on April 23, 1904 (33 Stat., 297), so as to read as follows: That in all cases where it shall appear that a double allotment of land has heretofore been, or siiall hereafter bs, wrongfully or erroneously mada by the Secretary of the Interior to any Indian by an assumed name or otherwise, or where a mistake has been or shall be mads in the description of the land inserted in any patent, said Secretary is hereby authorized and directed, during the time that the United States may hold the titla to the land in trust for any such Indian, and for which, a conditional patant may hav9 been issued, to rectify and correct 3uch mistakes and cancel any patent which may have bean thus erroneously and wrongfully issued whenever in his opinion the same ought to be canceled for error in the issue-, thereof, and if possession of the original patent can not be |