Proclamation 1369—Fort Peck Indian Reservation, Montana

Whereas, the Act of Congress approved May 30, 1908 (35 Stat., 558), providing for the survey and allotment of lands within the former Fort Peck Indian Reservation, Montana, and the sale and disposal of all the surplus lands after allotment, among other things directed that prior to the disposition of the surplus lands, such lands should be classified and appraised by three commissioners as agricultural land, grazing land, arid land and mineral land, the mineral land not to be appraised;

And Whereas, the commissioners appointed for the purpose of making the classifications and appraisals in some cases designated and appraised lands as agricultural or grazing which the United States Geological Survey classified as coal lands;

And Whereas, certain homestead entries theretofore erroneously allowed for the said classified and appraised coal lands were validated, under the provisions of the Act of February 27, 1917 (Public No. 385), by Proclamation of March 21, 1917, which also provided that a Proclamation should thereafter issue prescribing the time when and the manner in which the coal lands not embraced in such homestead entries should become subject to agricultural disposition; And Whereas, there are a number of homestead applications for the coal lands which were filed at the Glasgow, Montana, land office on and before November 19, 1916, on which date the register and receiver were instructed that the coal lands were not subject to homestead entry, which were subsequently rejected for such reason and which were not validated by Proclamation of March 21, 1917;

Now, Therefore, I, Woodrow Wilson, President of the United States of America, by virtue of the power and authority vested in me by the aforesaid acts of Congress do hereby prescribe, proclaim and make known that all homestead applications for the said coal lands classified and appraised as agricultural, grazing or arid, filed at the Glasgow land office on or before November 19, 1916, which were rejected by the register and receiver because of the coal classification and which were not validated by Proclamation of March 21, 1917, shall be allowed under the provisions of the Act of February 27, 1917, above cited, if otherwise regular, and that the remaining coal lands classified and appraised as aforesaid, not embraced in validated homestead entries and not otherwise appropriated or reserved, shall be disposed of under the general provisions of the homestead and desert land laws and of the said Acts of Congress, with a reservation of the coal deposits, and be opened to settlement and entry and be settled upon, occupied and entered in the following manner and not otherwise:

1. Execution and Presentation of Applications. - - On and after the date hereof, any person who is qualified to make entry under the general provisions of the homestead laws may swear to and present an application to make homestead entry for said lands, or any such person who is entitled to the benefits of Sections 2304, 2305 and 2307, of the Revised Statutes of the United States, may file a declaratory statement therefor. Lands designated under the enlarged homestead Act may be entered in quantities of 320 acres. Prior to June 1, 1917, applications and declaratory statements must conform to present agricultural classifications, and no petitions for designation either under the enlarged or the grazing homestead Act will be accepted. Each application to make homestead entry and each declaratory statement filed in person must be sworn to by the applicant before the Register or the Receiver of the United States land office at Glasgow, Montana, or before a United States Commissioner, or a judge or a clerk of a court of record residing in the county in which the land is situated, or before any such officer who resides outside the county and in the land district and is nearest or most accessible to the land. The agent's affidavit to each declaratory statement filed by agent must be sworn to by the agent before one of such officers, but the power of attorney appointing the agent may be sworn to by the declarant before any officer in the United States having a seal and authority to administer oaths. After applications have been sworn to, they must be presented to the Register and Receiver of the Glasgow land office. Applicants may present the application in person, by mail, or otherwise. No person shall be permitted to present more than one application in his own behalf.

2. Purchase Money, Fees and Commissions. - - One-fifth of the appraised price of the land applied for must be paid at the time of entry and a sum equal thereto must be tendered with all applications to make homestead entry. Such sum will also be required with declaratory statements presented on or before May 5, 1917, and when so tendered will be disposed of as hereinafter provided. In addition, each application to make homestead entry must be accompanied by a fee of $5, if the area is less than 81 acres or $10, if 81 acres or more, and commissions at the rate of $1.50 for each 40-acre tract applied for; and each declaratory statement must be accompanied by a fee of $3.

3. Disposition of Applications. - - All homestead applications and declaratory statements presented hereunder, received by the Register and Receiver on or before May 5, 1917, and all applications for these lands filed at the Glasgow land office on or after November 20, 1916, and rejected by the Register and Receiver because of the coal classification, shall be treated as filed simultaneously, and where there is no conflict such applications and statements, if in proper form and accompanied by the required payment, will be allowed. If such applications or statements conflict in whole or in part, the right of the respective applicants will be determined by a public drawing to be conducted by or under the supervision of the Superintendent of Openings and Sales of Indian Reservations, at the Glasgow land office, beginning at 10 o'clock a.m., on May 8, 1917. The names of the persons who presented the conflicting applications and statements will be written on cards and these cards shall be placed in envelopes upon which there are no distinctive or identifying marks. These envelopes shall be thoroughly and impartially mixed, and, after being mixed, shall be drawn one at a time by some disinterested person. As the envelopes are drawn the cards shall be removed, numbered beginning with number one, and fastened to the applications of the proper persons, which shall be the order in which the applications and statements shall be acted upon and disposed of. If homestead application or declaratory statement cannot be allowed for any part of the land applied for, it shall be rejected. If it may be allowed for part of, but not for all, the land applied for, the applicant, or the declarant through his agent, shall be allowed thirty days from receipt of notice within which to notify the Register and Receiver what disposition to make thereof. During such time, he may request that the application or statement be allowed for the land not in conflict and rejected as to the land in conflict, or that it be rejected as to all the land applied for; or he may apply to have the application or statement amended to include other land which is subject to entry and to inclusion in his application or statement, provided he is the prior applicant. If it is determined by the drawing that a declaratory statement shall be acted upon and disposed of before a homestead application for the same land, the homestead applicant shall be allowed thirty days from receipt of notice within which to advise the Register and Receiver whether to reject his application, or to allow it subject to the declaratory statement. If an applicant, or a declarant or his agent, fails to notify the Register and Receiver what disposition to make of the application or statement, within the time allowed, it will be rejected as to all the land applied for. Homestead applications and declaratory statements which are presented after May 5, 1917, will be received and noted in the order of their filing, and will be acted upon and disposed of in the usual manner after all such applications and statements presented on or before that date have been acted upon and disposed of.

4. Disposition of Moneys. - - Moneys tendered with applications and statements presented on or before May 5, 1917, except fees for filing declaratory statements, will be deposited by the Receiver of the Glasgow land office, to his official credit and properly accounted for. The fee for filing a declaratory statement must be paid even though the application is rejected, and such fee will be properly applied when the statement is filed. When a homestead application is allowed in whole or in part, the sums required as fees, commissions, and purchase money will be properly applied, and any sum in excess of the required amount will be returned to the applicant. When a declaratory statement is allowed in whole or in part, the sum which will be required as purchase money if entry is made under the declaratory statement will be held until entry has been allowed under the statement or the time has expired within which entry may be made, and any sum in excess of the required amount will be returned to the declarant. The moneys held will not be returned until the time has expired within which entry may be made under the statement but will be returned as soon as possible thereafter if entry is not made. Moneys tendered with applications and statements which are rejected in whole, except fees for filing declaratory statements, will be returned. If an applicant or declarant fails to secure all the land applied for and amends his application or statement to embrace other lands, the moneys theretofore tendered will be applied on account of the required payment under the amended application. If it is not sufficient, the applicant or declarant will be required to pay the deficiency, and if it is more than sufficient, the excess will be returned. Money returned to applicants or declarants will be returned by the official check of the Receiver. Moneys tendered with applications or statements presented after May 5, 1917, will be deposited by the Receiver in the usual manner.

5. Form of Entries. - - Entries embracing 160 acres must, as nearly as possible, embrace the northeast, northwest, southeast, or southwest quarter of a section; entries embracing as much as 320 acres, the north or south half of a section. Persons desiring to enter less than a quarter section may apply for any legal subdivision or subdivisions. In case part of a quarter or half section, as above provided, is not subject to disposition hereunder applicants may apply for adjacent lands in such manner as to affect the least possible number of quarter or half sections as above described.

6. Deferred Payments. - - The purchase money not required at the time of entry may be paid in five equal, annual installments, unless commutation proof is made. These payments will become due at the end of one, two, three, four and five years after the date of entry. The time for the payment of one-half of any such installment may be extended for one year at a time, upon the payment of interest in advance at the rate of five per centum per annum; Provided, the last payment and all other payments must be made within eight years from the date of entry. If commutation proof is made, all the unpaid installments must be paid at that time. Where three-year proof is submitted, the entryman may make payment of the unpaid installments at that time or at any time before they become due and final certificate will issue, in the absence of objection, upon such payment being made.

7. Forfeiture. - - Failure to make any payment that may be due, unless the same be extended, or to make any extended payment at or before the time to which such payment has been extended, as herein provided, shall forfeit the entry and the same shall be canceled, and any and all payments theretofore shall be forfeited.

8. Settlement before Entry. - - The lands will become subject to settlement before entry on June 1, 1917, and not before then.

9. Desert Land Entry. - - Lands of the character contemplated by the desert land laws will be enterable under those laws and the aforesaid Acts of Congress on and after June 1, 1917, provided entrymen are able to fully meet the requirements of the desert land laws and regulations. If entered under the desert land laws, the appraised price of the land may be paid in annual installments, the same as in homestead cases, with the exceptions that no extensions of time for payments can be granted and that all unpaid installments of purchase money must be paid whenever final proof is submitted.

10. Coal Lands not Classified and Appraised Without Regard to Coal Deposits. - - The coal lands not classified and appraised without regard to the coal deposits shall not become subject to settlement or entry under agricultural laws until so provided by further Proclamation.

11. Rules and Regulations. - - The Secretary of the Interior is hereby authorized to make and prescribe such rules and regulations as may be necessary to carry the provisions of this Proclamation into full force and effect.

In Witness Whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.

Done at the City of Washington, this 28th day of April, in the year of our Lord Nineteen Hundred and Seventeen and of the Independence of the United States the One Hundred and Forty-first.

WOODROW WILSON.

By the President:

ROBERT LANSING,

Secretary of State.