The hydrography of the Sacramento Valley. Typographical description of the catchment area of the interior basin. Conservation of flood waters and irrigation proposed as remedies for destructive floods. Reclamation of the Sacramento and San Joaquin river lands

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The Hydrography of the
Sacramento Valley

<3

TYPOGRAPHICAL DESCRIP-
TION OF THE CATCHMENT;
AREA OF THE INTERIOR*
BASIN # CONSERVATION OF
FLOOD WATERS AND IRRI-
GATION PROPOSED AS REME-
DIES FOR DESTRUCTIVE
FLOODS * RECLAMATION OF
THE SACRAMENTO AND SAN
JOAQUIN RIVER LANDS j* *

By WM. H. MILLS
(Originally published in the San Francisco Call)

California State Board of Trade Bulletin No. II.

Realizing the great importance of the navigation of the
Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers and the drainage of the
overflowed region contiguous to them, the California State
Board of Trade, in Decemher, 1903, by resolution suggested
the holding of a convention at Sacramento to consider these
matters. The Sacramento Chamber of Commerce and the

*!•**'*. SftocIJtpflj CKamber of Commerce had the subject under con-
99 ^i<Jejatioiri,.but. no definite action was taken at that time.

::•*:.•*: '4«*atH.tfe»* •Subject became so pressing that the Sacramento
Chamber of Commerce took the matter up and called a State
convention at San Fancisco, the proceedings of which were
made public and the problems involved were assigned to a
general committee created by the convention.

The articles herewith written by Mr. William H. Mills,
a director of the California State Board of Trade, handles
the subject in a most intelligent and comprehensive manner.
These merit wide circulation, as they deal with important
facts closely related to the problems involved. For this rea-
son the California State Board of Trade produces this bul-
letin in aid of the inquiry and investigation now being made.
These articles first appeared in the San Francisco "Call" on
Monday, June 6th, and Monday, July 4th.

CALIFORNIA STATE BOARD OF TRADE,

ARTHUR R. BRIGGS, Manager.

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The Hydrography of the
Sacramento Valley

HE catchment area of the San Joaquin and
Sacramento rivers embraces approximate-
ly 48 per cent of the entire area of the
State, or a region comprising about 70,000
square miles.

These two valleys of the Sacramento
and San Joaquin may be termed the interior basin of Cali-
fornia. From the highest point of watershed on the south
to the source of the Sacramento river, near Mount Shasta
on the north, the distance in a straight line is about 525
miles. Of this 275 miles belongs to the San Joaquin and
250 miles to the Sacramento. Both rivers constitute the
central drainage of a region lying between two ranges of
mountains. The Sacramento River, the drainage of the
northern portion of this basin, flows south, the San Joaquin
River, the drainage of the southern portion of the region,
flows north, until they find their confluence on the eastern
margin of Suisun Bay. From this point to their outlet to

the sea, at the west end of the straits of the Golden Gate,
they are one river.

The Combined Rivers.

This single river, which flows through Suisun Bay, the
lower portion of San Pablo Bay and the upper end of San
Francisco Bay to its final point of emptying or drainage into
the sea, is without name, being overshadowed by geographi-
cal designations in the way of names of bays ; but the law of
gravitation operates quite unconscious of the names of the
lakes or basins through which a river flows. In very truth
the west end of the straits of the Golden Gate is the mouth
of the combined rivers which flow into the Sacramento and
San Joaquin rivers and the Suisun, San Pablo and San Fran-
cisco bays, and when all these are taken into account, that
is, when the streams that flow into the bays, including the
Napa River, Petaluma Creek and the drainage of the Santa
Clara, San Ramon and other valleys tributary to the bay
system are considered, they form one single river having a
catchment area equal to 75,OOO square miles, which reaches
sea level through the Golden Gate.

The paramount factor, when drainage is under considera-
tion, is the relation of this sea level to the high and low
water in the system of bays and the direct influence which
this sea level has upon the lower courses of the Sacramento
and San Joaquin rivers.

As the American pioneers found this primitive condition,
the tide- rose and fell every day at Knights Landing, thirty-
five miles by the channel of the river above Sacramento, and

the tide influenced the drainage capacity of the San Joaquin
as far inland as Stockton. When the Central Pacific Rail-
road was built, in pursuance of an Act of Congress granting
aid for the construction of a railroad from the Missouri River
to the Pacific Ocean, Sacramento was accepted as the Pacific
Ocean terminus because Pacific Ocean tides were encountered
at that point.

A.

While the current of a tidal river is not absolutely arrest-
ed, it is obstructed. At higri tide in Suisun Bay, there is still
a current down the courses of the Sacramento and San Joa-
quin, but on a higher plane. The rivers rise in response to
this tidal influence; and the rise of a river at any given
point is referable to one of two causes — reither the river above
that point has received an accession to its current or its out-
flow is obstructed below the point. In the case of the Sacra-
mento and San Joaquin rivers, it is known that, the daily rise
of the river during the drouth period of seven months is re-
ferable solely to the obstruction of the tide.

The tides of the ocean, then, obstruct the outflow of the
waters of the San Joaquin and Sacramento rivers to a dis-
tance of over 125 miles from the mouth of the combined
rivers at the western outlet of the Golden Gate. The Sac-
ramento River, opposite the city of Sacramento, has an ele-
vation of 30 feet above sea level, or less than 3 inches to the
mile of its course to the sea. The ebb tide through the
Golden Gate vastly exceeds the flood tide which flows inward,
because it carries outward the water which the tide has de-
livered to the tidal reservoir? composing the bay system and
5—

the accumulated arcd obstructed waters of the vast catchment
area already disclosed.

TOPOGRAPHY OF AREA.

To this point, we have but one side of the story. We
have brought to view a river 125 miles in length with an
average fall of less than three inches to the mile. We must
now consider the topography of the catchment area and
rainfall which feeds this river.

The two rivers which flow to the north and to the south
and which, turning abruptly west at right angles to their
general course, drain two great valleys having the Sierra
Nevada Mountains for their eastern and the Coast Range
for their western wall, drain these two ranges of mountains
to their very summits, and fully 60 per cent, or 42,000 square
miles, of their catchment area has an inclination of from 10
degrees to 60 degrees. Upon this unlifted area two-thirds
of the entire precipitation of both valleys fall. While this
statement is sufficiently comprehensive to those familiar with
the facts, for the sake of perspicuity it will be illustrated in
detail.

The Sacramento River rises at the north line of Township
40 north, in a straight line, 250 miles by mathematical dem-
onstration from the top of Mount Diablo. From its source
to the head of the Sacramento Valley, in a straight line a
distance of 48 miles, it has over 3000 feet fall. It receives
Fall River, McCioud River and Pitt River as its eastern
tributaries, and these rise at an ^titude of between 3000 and

—6

4OOO feet. They have an average fall of nearly 100 feet to
the mile in their entire course.

The annual precipitation in the mountain district, which
constitutes the catchment area of the upper end of the Sac-
ramento system, is more than twice the annual rainfall at
Chico, and in addition to this the area is subject to phenome-
nal precipitation, as for instance, five or six inches in from
six to ten hours at Delta.

Following the Sacramento on both sides the same condi-
tion is maintained. Cow Creek, Deer Creek, Antelope Creek,
Mill Creek, Rock Creek, Pine Creek and Butte Creek on the
east and Elder Creek, Red Bank Creek, Cottonwood Creek,
Toms Creek and Stoney Creek on the west, all in the high
altitudes, receive nearly double the annual precipitation of
rainfall in their upper courses of that which visits the imme-
diate area of the Sacramento River, and delivers this precipi-
tation, by reason of the inclination of the mountainous dis-
trict, down channels which make their currents necessarily
torrential.

Then the Feather River, two-thirds of whose drainage
area stands at an angle of from 15 to 60 degrees, is encount-
ered, and the Yuba and Bear rivers, branches of the Feather
River, are practically mountain torrents.

The American River.

Topographical facts relating to the American River will be
given in detail as peculiarly illustrative of the situation. The
American River has its confluence with the Sacramento River
at the city of Sacramento. The mouth of the American
7—

River is in township 8 north, range 4 east. It has three
well-defined river channels in township 13 north, range 15
east. The surveys of the Government show that the dis-
tance between the mouth and the well-defined sources of this
river is but fifty-four miles and these sources are 6000 feet
above the mouth of the river.

It is difficult to realize, but it is mathematically true, that
a horizontal line fifty-four miles long drawn from the head-
waters of the American down to its mouth would stand 6000
feet above the city of Sacramento, and the river channel
must take up all of this fall in its course of less than seventy-
five miles, even by way of the channel itself. Here is an
important tributary of the Sacramento River, having an
average fall of eighty feet to the mile, delivering its rainfall
and its snow melt into a channel which, from that point to
the sea, has less than three inches of fall to the mile.

The upper courses of the American River have more than
double the annual precipitation of that recorded at the city
of Sacramento. Graphically presented, then, draw two
straight lines, one running norh 275 miles and the other south
250 miles to a point of junction, where they turn at right
angles west to the sea through a single combined channel;
then from the high summits of twro mountain ranges draw
the confluents at right angles with the central drainage and
with the central axis of the mountains ; give these tributaries
a decliviy of from sixty to one hundred feet fall to the mile
and give their catchment areas double the annual precipita-
tion of the lower courses of the main drainage and we have
a series of torrential streams delivering flood volumes in a

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comparatively few hours into channels which possess the very
meager and limited drainage capacity of less than three inches
fall to the mile.

B.

Cache Creek and Putah Creek each flow into the Yolo
Solano basin, and furnish additional illustration. Cache
Creek rises in Clear Lake, thus adding the most of Lake
County to the catchment area of the Sacramento River.
Putah Creek rises in the eastern portion of Napa County
and thus adds nearly one-half of that county to the drainage
area of the Sacramento River. From the outlet at Lower
Lake to Rumsey at the head of Capay Valley, it is 16 miles,
and the river in that district has a i6oo-foot fall; through
Capay Valley from Rumsey to Capay, 26 miles, the river
has 400 foot fall ; from Capay to Tule Basin it has 1 2-foot
fall to the mile.

The Inexorable Law of Drainage.

The cross section area of a river-bed must be correlated
with the volume of water it is supposed to carry at any
given rate of fall. The stream is attenuated down a chan-
nel possessing a steep declivity. It is enlarged as the rate
of fall decreases and the cross section area of the river must
be correspondingly increased to carry its waters within its
banks. The cross section area must correspond exactly with
the volume of water to be carried and the velocity of the cur-
rent.

When the accumulated flood waters of all the tributaries
of the Sacramento, which, as shown, have their rise in the

high altitudes of two ranges of mountains, the cross section
area of the channel of the central drainage must be greatly
augmented to compensate for the diminution of the fall.

Applying these principles, the cross section area of the Sac-
ramento River at flood stages can be readily postulated. For
the time being, the flood stage is a river and the area it occu-
pies is merely its natural channel or the channel that would
be occupied if the flood stage was merely the normal condi-
tion of that river.

Tide Obstructs the Current.

When a tide moves eastward through the Straits of Car-
qu:nez drainage of the great basin is entiHj suspended and,
as already shown, there is an obstructing tidal influence for
at least one hundred miles up the channels of both rivers.
Thus the low stage of Suisun Bay affords all the drainage
these rivers can by any possibility have. But the elevation
of Suisun Bay is determined by the relation of the sea to the
bay system, and the lower courses of the rivers cannot be
changed or modified except by a change of the sea level itself.

Owing to the greater rainfall upon the catchment area
of the Sacramento, its flood stages are often higher than those
of the San Joaquin. The observation of this phenomenon
has led to the fallacy of supposing that the Sacramento might
be relieved by turning its waters into the channel of the San
Joaquin by an artificial canal ; that is, invoking the aid of the
San Joaquin in the drainage of the Sacramento. But the
sea level status of Suisun Bay is the controlling factor when
drainage is considered. When the waters of these rivers reach

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Suisun Bay they are subject to the same law; therefore, the
proposition to empty the waters of one into the channel of the
other is attended by the absurdity of supposing that a river
may empty itself by delivering a part of its current into its
own channel. Both rivers find a common and paramount
obstruction in the ocean tides of Suisun Bay.

The meteorological conditions to which the recurrence of
great floods in the interior basin are referable are familiar to
all the residents of the valleys. One foot of newly-fallen
snow is equal to one inch of rainfall, but when ten feet of
snow is found it equals fifteen or eighteen inches of rainfall,
because the snow has compacted by its weight. When the
upper courses of the tributaries of the Sacramento lying from
5000 to 6000 feet above the central drainage of the valley
contain from five to ten feet of snow and receive a precipita-
tion of from ten to fifteen inches of rainfall within three days
that carries off the snow, the water is delivered to the drain-
age channels of those tributaries as rain runs off the steep
roofs of houses.

Receive the Floods.

The Sacramento and San Joaquin are tidal rivers for nearly
100 miles of their lower courses and must receive these tor-
rential floods and deliver them to the ocean through channels
which have but thirty feet fall in 125 miles.

Thus it is that, after an American occupancy of fifty-five
years, the problem of drainage remains unsolved. But litfle
has been learned and absolutely nothing has been done to meet
the exigencies of the situation. The great flood of the early
11—

5o's, the greater flood of February, 1861, and the recurrent
great flood of 1904 manifested the same destructive tenden-
cies that would have attended them 100 years ago. They
destroyed the island reclamation at the mouths of the Sac-
ramento and San Joaquin rivers, and with it destroyed the
engineering theories that such reclamation is not an obstruc-
tion to the outflow of the floods. The recurrence of great
floods is just as certain as the recurrence of the rainy season.

Uplifted areas like those which constitute more than half
the interior basin, must necessarily suffer erosion when the
surface of their escarpment is broken by the pasturage of
domestic animals and the general occupation of man. This
erosion was accelerated by hydraulic and other mining, but
it had been in process centuries before California was inhabit-
ed and will continue in all the centuries to come. In a com-
paratively recent period the system of bays extended to the
mouth of the Feather River and up the San Joaquin as far
as Stockton. In the process of time Suisun Bay will be filled
and the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers will flow through
one well-defined channel into the Straits of Carquinez and
thence to the sea.

Chapters of Failures.

The history of engineering experiment and theory presents
merely chapters of failures. Engineers were found to approve
of the drainage act under which an attempt was made to
impound the mining detritus by the construction of brush
dams. The distinguished engineer James B. Eads was
brought to the State for the purpose of bearing testimony in

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favor of the practicability of that scheme. He gave a very
reluctant assent, saying that the experiment was worthy the
trial, but the experiment merely demonstrated the utter fal-
lacy of all the theories concerning it. Two hundred and
fifty thousand dollars of State money was expended to make
this one experiment. The channel of the Yuba, a high alti-
tude tributary of the Feather River, was selected for the ex-
periment. The first flood destroyed the works that had been
erected for its control, with an imperious disregard for engi-
neering theories.

The Sierra Nevada tributaries of the Sacramento and San
Joaquin rivers have a velocity of current which makes it im-
possible to check arrest or impound their waters in their
channels. The force of ten thousand cannon balls would be
feeble in comparison with the torrents which sweep with de-
structive velocity down these streams. A stone dam anchored
to the bedrock might be constructed to stand, but the reser-
voir area would fill up the first season and the detritus which
results from the perpetual erosion of the mountain declivities
would simply fall over the top of the dam and possess no
economical value unless for creating electrical power.

Remedy Is Proposed.

It would be merely quoting the opinion of engineers to
say that the only remedy for this is the storage of the flood
waters of these streams. All of the tributaries of the two
drainage channels of the valleys might be economically stored
when they reach the general level of the plain below, while
up the mountain courses of many of these streams there is
13—

ample opportunity for holding back the flood waters and feed-
ing them into the main channels at a rate consistent with
their drainage capacity. In the course of time this will be
done. In the natural course of events the Sacramento and
San Joaquin valleys will be irrigated and irrigation uniformly
destroys rivers.

The Government of the United States has entered upon a
scheme of arid land reclamation by irrigation, as relates to
the Colorado River, which will destroy the navigability of
that stream. It has already assumed the position that the
superior public uses of the Colorado River is irrigation, and
not navigation. Water sufficient to irrigate the great inte-
rior basin of this State must necessarily be stored. The
summer stages of all the streams, which when combined create
the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers, are not equal to the
demand for the irrigation of these great valleys. When the
aggregate precipitation of common years is accumulated by
storage and devoted to the fertilization of the Sacramento and
San Joaquin plains, the flood stages of the Sacramento and
San Joaquin will disappear.

Combination of meteorological conditions will create floods
at wide intervals of time, which will be more or less destruc-
tive, but the usual condition will be full channels all the year
round attended by navigable conditions of the highest eco-
nomic value. That this result will be achieved is inevitable
and the force that will bring it into being is the obvious values
to be developed by the undertaking.

The task of impounding the flood waters of the streams
supplying the great interior water ways appears stupendous

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only to those who are unfamiliar with precedent. We stand
appalled before the vast sums of money required for its ac-
complishment, but the magnitude of these sums sinks into
comparative insignificance when measured by the stupendous
aggregate o f value to be created and the vast populations
hereafter to be sharers in the invaluable benefits.

In further discussion of the important subject of the
reclamation of the Sacramento and San Joaquin river lands,
Mr. Mills says:

Public policies are founded upon the ascertained knowl-
edge and the most cogent reasons influencing determination
in the minds of men at the time of their adoption. Later,
when the knowledge is becoming obscure and the argument
which prevailed in the adoption of the policy is forgotten,
the policy is often summoned to the bar of public opinion
for a new hearing and determination. Because human
judgment is not infallible the unexpected is the only thing
that is certain to happen, and since all human institutions are
impeachable, it is eminently proper that their wisdom should
be reviewed in the strong light of experience.

It is sometimes unfortunate that the assault upon an es-
tablished policy is led by persons who are unfamiliar with
the history of legislation relating to such policy, and who,
with that intrepidity which attends insufficient information,
become the proponent of methods once fully investigated or
tried and condemned.

Policy of Reclamation.
The reclamation policy of California is just now under-

going preliminary impeachment preparatory to the introduc-
tion of proposed reforms. A review of the policy now pro-
posed and a presentation of the relations it bears to the history
of legislation cannot be devoid of popular interest.

The proposed changes in the policy of reclamation may be
summarized as follows:

"i. — To abandon the policy of reclamation by districts or
other economic consideration relating to the relative reclaim-
ability of land and resort to reclamation by a single system
In which all the swamp lands shall be assessed equally for the
reclamation of all.

"2. — To this end it is proposed that the State shall resume
control of all swamp land, whether reclaimed or unreclaimed,
levying a special assessment on the reclaimed swamp land of
the State in the interest of reclaiming all of the swamp land.

"3. — To levy a general annual tax upon all property in the
State for a period of ten years and ask the Government to
co-operate for an equivalent sum for the same period.

"4. — To estimate the cost of a complete reclamation sys-
tem, including the rectification of river channels, the con-
struction of additional channels for the relief of flood waters,
and after subtracting the sum contributed from the general
taxation on all property of the State and the contribution of
the Federal Government, to assess the remaining cost for this
general reclamation upon all the lands of the district regard-
less of relative benefits."

Disregarding general details, these four propositions out-
line the reformed policy now proposed.

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Story of the Grant.

By Act of Congress, approved September 28, 1850, the
State of California received approximately 1,500,000 acres of
swamp and overflowed lands. The act itself declared that
the donation was made "to enable the several States to con-
struct the necessary levees and drains to reclaim the swamp
and overflow lands therein." The Act then proceeds to
declare :

"It shall be the duty of the Secretary of the Interior to
make accurate lists and plats of all such lands, and transmit
the same to the Governors of the several States in which said
lands may lie, and at the request of the Governor of any State
in which said swamp and overflow lands may be, to cause
patents to be issued to said State therefor, conveying to said
State the fee-simple of said lands.

"The proceeds of said lands made from sale or by direct
appropriation in kind, shall be applied exclusively, as far as
necessary, to reclaiming said lands by means of levees and
drains."

The foregoing excerpts present the letter of the law. It
is of the highest importance that the terminology employed
should have careful consideration.

The first paragraph quoted declares that the Secretary of
the Interior shall make lists and plats of the lands and at
the request of the Governor of any State, shall cause patents
to be issued to the State, "conveying to said State the fee-
simple of said land." The statute itself plainly declares that
the patent issued by the Government of the United States

shall convey a title in fee simple and this is the full equivalent
of declaring that the title is passed by the patent without
condition.

But the second paragraph quoted enjoins upon the State
the policy of applying the proceeds derived from the sale of
the land to the reclamation of the lands themselves by the
construction of levees and drains.

Provision Not Mandatory.

The provision that the proceeds of the sale should be ap-
plied exclusively, so far as necessary, to the reclamation of
the swamp lands was advisory and not mandatory. This
statement must be accepted as conclusive since the act itself
declares that the Government patent conveys "to the said
State the fee simple of the land." Any reservation or excep-
tion on the part of the Government was necessarily cut off by
the issue of the patent, while at the same time it may be freely
admitted that the whole transaction has the color of a grant
for purposes of reclamation. This is, however, not to be
construed as a declaration that such reclamation is a condi-
tion precedent to the receipt of title or that the failure to re-
claim shall work a forfeiture of such title.

The State was admitted to the Union of States on Septem-
ber 9, 1850, and the act in question was passed September
28, 1850, when the State was only nineteen days old.

If the obligation of reclamation arbitrarily accompanied
the gift the propriety of its acceptance would have been de-
batable, if not wholly inadvisable. The conditions attend-
ing the swamp lands granted were wholly unknown. The

—18

economic value of the grant itself was equally unknown.
Hence the people of California could not have known whe-
ther the acceptance of the grant accompanied by an arbitrary
obligation to reclaim all the lands granted would not be the
assumption of a task the fulfillment of which would be
wholly uneconomic, if not impossible.

No Time Limit Made.

There was no declaration in the law and no possible in-
ference to be derived from it imposing upon the State the
duty to reclaim the land within a given time or to reclaim
all of the swTamp and overflowed lands granted. On the
contrary, it was clearly within the province of the State to
proceed with such reclamation in such a manner as to ac-
complish the ultimate result at such time and in such way as
would be most advantageous to the State itself.

The first Act relating to swamp land was approved May 1,
1851, eight months after the date of the Act granting the
land. This Act granted 640 acres of swamp land on Merritt
Island to John F. Booth and David Galloway, and provided
that they should reclaim the land, bring it under cultivation
and report the result to the Legislature. The cautious and
conservative wisdom of this Act will be apparent.

From this beginning, which related merely to an experi-
ment with 640 acres of swamfp land very easily reclaimable,
the subject occupied legislative attention at intervals until
1868, when the general Act which to-day constitutes the
frame-work of the State swamp land policy was enacted.

The policy underlying this Act was evolutionary. It was

the suggestion of legislative experiment beginning with the
Act quoted, and rising through the Acts of April 25, 1855,
April 21, 1858, April 18, 1859, May 13, 1861, April 27,
1863, and April 22, 1866. Each of these acts underwent
preliminary discussion in the public mind and parliamentary
examination by the Legislature. Leading up to the Act of
1 868, the entire question of swamp land reclamation was made
the subject of thoughtful examination and public advocacy
by the very best minds the State has ever produced.

The suggestion of combining all the swamp land into one
reclamation district and pursuing a system of reclamation
that would distribute the burden of its cost to each acre of
swamp land alike, regardless of the relative reclamability of
the land, is now brought forward as an original suggestion,
whereas it was advocated and traversed until not one grain
of wrheat was left in tlic thrice-threshed straw.

Experience Is Cited.

The experience of reclamation in older countries was ap-
pealed to and the lesson of such experiment was read into
the current discussion of the time. The policy of attempt-
ing a complete reclamation of all swamp lands by placing the
ultimate value of all such lands behind the enterprise was re-
jected, because then, as now, the data upon which the ecen-
omic value of the policy could be determined was wholly
wanting. There was not then and is not to-day sufficient
information concerning the cost of reclamation by that plan,
or the economic value of the result, to justify the undertaking.

The granting act required the Secretary of the Interior to

—20

make an accurate list and plat of all the swamp lands and
transmit these plats to the Governors of the States being
beneficiaries of the grant and upon the request of such States,
to issue patents conveying the title in fee-simple. This had
not been done when the people of California addressed their
attention seriously to the question of reclaiming these lands
in good faith and of adding their areas to the productive
wealth of the State; and the requirements of the law have
not yet been fully accomplished.

The knowledge of the subject was general, not specific.
It was well known that the lands were divided by their
physical condition into five natural classes:

"i. — Lands overflowed at extreme flood stages of the rivers
and covered with water for a period so short as to be benefi-
cial rather than injurious and to be practically a substitute
for annual irrigation.

"2. — Lands overflowed but a short period in each year and
at medium flood stages of rivers ; reciaimable at small cost and
possessing high intrinsic value after reclamation.

"3 — Marsh lands on the margin of tidal reservoirs com-
prising the bay system, economically reclaimable and highly
valuable when reclaimed.

"4 — Swamp lands lying within a single hydrographic sys-
tem, comprising all the grades of relative reclaimability, but
more economically reclaimable by treatment as a system than
in separate parts.

"5. — Lands wholly irreclaimable by any other method than
an absolute control of the entire hydrographic phenomena of
the interior basin of the State."
21—

Revenue Lacking.

The cost relating to the reclamation of this fifth class was
far beyond the financial possibilities of the time. The only
inducement to the reclamation of any of the land was the
value of the land after its reclamation. There was no
source of revenue available for this purpose. The legislative
experiments prior to 1868 had demonstrated this fact beyond
all controversy. The appeal to State or Government aid
was wholly impracticable. The State was not in a position
financially to enter upon the cost of reclaiming all its swamp
land property in one general scheme of reclamation, because
it was apparent then as now that the cost of such an under-
taking would exceed $100,000,000, while the assurance which
would have proffered a request to the Government to add its
munificence by reclaiming the property it had presented to
the State had not reached the stage of pauperizing depend-
ence it has attained in recent times.

Mining was the paramount industry of the country and the
hydraulic method was in full operation. Hydraulic mining
was charging the tributaries of the Sacramento and San Joa-
quin rivers with detritus, which was being forced down the
channels of these tributaries on a declivity of 100 feet to the
mile and into a central drainage having less than four inches
to the mile. The detritus thus forced into the channel of
the main streams must necessarily lodge, and the time at
which the Sacramento River in particular would wander at
will over the alluvial bottom land of the valley could not be
foretold.

All commercial and industrial activities, including agricul-

—22

ture, horitculture, manufacturing and merchandise, were
then merely subordinate and allied industries to mining. The
absence of rail communication with the East had denied an
Eastern market for the field, orchard and vineyard products
of the State. Hence the proposition? of arresting the de-
struction of the valley by enjoining hydraulic mining had
not been dreamed of.

The rapid filling up of the main channel of the central
drainage constituted a menace to successful reclamation. The
danger was apparent that the river beds would fill up, that
the flood maximums would rise, that reclamation levees would
have to be increased in height and that vast quantities of
mining detritus would be imposed upon the valley lands.

The Only Inducement*

The State was confronted with the condition, which had
been fully demonstrated by experiment, that the value of the
land when reclaimed was the only inducement to its recla-
mation. It therefore entered upon the reclamation of that
which was most readily and economically reclaimable, leav-
ing the more costly work of reclamation to a time when al-
luvial deposition, which was then and is now steadily in pro-
gress, would make the problem of reclamation more easy,
when, by reason of the growth of the commonwealth and
the greater density of its population, the land reclaimed
would possess a higher value.

During the discussion which was the Genesis of the Act of
1 868, it was proposed by some of the very best minds of the
State to adopt the mound system of reclamation in use on the

lower course of the Nile. The late B. B. Redding, to
whose patriotism and intellectual breadth this commonwealth
is still under obligation, was the leading proponent of this
plan.

The wisdom of the Act of 1868 has been fully demon-
strated. Since the enactment of that law, the swamp land pol-
icy of the State has been the subject of legislative attention,
as the acts approved on the following dates fully attest:
March, 16, 1872; March 28, 1872: Congressional Resolu
tion, 1878; March 29, 1878; April I, 1878; April 23, 1880;
March 24, 1893; March 17, 1897; March 2, 1901, and
March 16, 1901. Notwithstanding these acts, the general
policy underlying the Act of 1868 has not been changed in
any essential feature.

Reference has already been made to the fact that no one
possesses sufficient information on the subject to determine,
even with a remote probability of accuracy, the economic
value of a reclamation scheme having for its object the rec-
lamation of all the overflowed lands belonging to the State.
But beyond this, the question of the practicability of the
scheme from its legal aspect is worthy of thoughtful con-
sideration.

Question of Legality.

More than 1,200,000 acres of land granted to the State of
swamp and overflowed land have been granted to individuals
by patent which conveys the title without conditions. These
lands, notwithstanding they belong to the category of swamp
and overflowed lands, are as completely exempt from special

—24

assessment for the reclamation of other lands as any other
lands of the State.

The decision of the Supreme Court in the case of Kimball
vs. Reclamation Fund Commission, by superficial reading,
would seem to hold that Congress had by the Act granting
swamp and overflow lands to the State imposed upon the
grant itself the condition that the lands be reclaimed. What
the court decided was that, whereas the Legislature had in-
augurated a system for the reclamation of these lands by or-
ganizing a Board of Commissioners who were to superintend
the work, and had provided that in any district where a peti-
tion representing one-third in acres of the tract of land pro-
posed to be reclaimed was located, the appellant was bound
in law to take notice of the public statute and must be deem-
ed to have accepted the title in subordination of the para-
mount right and duty of the land to be reclaimed ; that a gen-
eral system for the purpose of reclamation had been inaugu-
rated and that wherever under the provisions of the law the
practical measures of reclamation had been set up the owners
of land within such district must submit to assessment for the
reclamation of the land they owned ; that the owner of lands
in a district to be reclaimed could not decline to contribute
to the cost of such reclamation and then enjoy the increment
which would ensue, but must contribute equally with other
owners, in the same district to the reclamation cost.

But this is far from declaring that the owners of swamp
land which has been reclaimed, who have received patents
from the State conveying a title without conditions, may now
be subjected to assessments upon their land for the purpose
25—

of reclaiming swamp land which they do not own.
Rulings of the Courts.

It has been claimed that whoever accepts title to swamp
land accepts such title in subordination to the paramount
right and duty of the State to cause the land to be reclaimed
by any method it might see fit to employ. If this contention
had been understood to be true, the liability of expenditure
on account of the reclamation of any swamp land purchased
from the State would never cease until the last acre of swamp
and overflowed land had been reclaimed. If this doctrine
had been promulgated and believed in from the first, the
State would never have parted title with one single acre, be-
cause, while the economic value of reclaimed portions of the
swamp land might be ascertained, the profitableness of re-
claiming it all at the expense of all was wholly unascertain-
able. No one would have attempted the reclamation of a
portion of this land with the understanding that he was event-
ually to be charged with a proportionate cost of reclaiming
all the other swamp and overflowed lands of the State.

But the fact that the swamp lands purchased from the
State are not charged with the duty or obligation to reclaim
other lands is no longer debatable or doubtful. Whatever
construction the decisions of the State court in this relation
may be susceptible of, the decisions of the Supreme Court of
the United States with reference to the meaning of the Act
granting swamp and overflowed lands to States are not am-
biguous and obscure.

In deciding the case of Mills County vs. Railroad Com-
panies, 107 U. S., 557> it was held:

—26

"The proviso of the second section of the Act, that the pro-
ceeds of the lands shall be applied exclusively, as far as nec-
essary, to the purpose of reclaiming the same by levees and
drains, imposed an obligation which rests upon the good faith
of the States. No trust was thereby attached to the lands,
and the title to them, which is derived from either of tht.
States, is not affected by the manner in which she performed
that obligation."

And again, in Hagar vs. Reclamation District, in U. S.,
701, it was said:

"It is not competent for the owners of land which is a part
of a grant to a State under the Swamp Land Act, 9 Stat.
519, to set up in proceedings begun to enforce a tax on the
land assessed under a State law for the purpose of draining
and improving it that the State law impairs the obligation of
the contract between the State and the United States and so
violates the constitution; because (i), if the Swamp Land
Act constituted a contract between the State and the United
States, he was no party to it; and (2) the appropriation of
the proceeds of the granted swamp lands rests solely in the
good faith of the State."

Meaning of Decisions.

In the first decision quoted it is declared that the obliga-
tion of a State to reclaim the land rests upon the State alone,
and that no trust is thereby attached to the land itself, but
that the title to such land when obtained from the State is not
affected by the manner in which the State might perform its
duty to the Government.
27—

In the second decision it is declared that the purchaser of
State swamp lands is not a party to the contract between the
State and the United States relating to reclamation, and
that the appropriation of the proceeds from the granted
swamp lands to reclamation rests solely upon the good faith
of the State.

These decisions of the highest tribunal of the land set at
rest the whole question as to the legal right of a State to now
create a swamp land district and include within its boundaries
reclaimed and unreclaimed land, and assess all the land so in-
cluded for purposes of general reclamation, and clearly dis-
closes the fact that the State possesses no such right.

This practically disposes of the proposition to abandon the
policy of reclamation by districts, and substitutes for it a
single reclamation system, embracing all of the lands, re-
claimed and unreclaimed, in one general system.

Considerations of brevity forbid any further examination
of the propositions which have been mooted in this paper.
The present purpose will have been accomplished by calling
attention to the fact that with the revival of the old abandon-
ed theory of a general reclamation system or none, theories
long since relegated to disuse by scientific inquiry are revived.
For instance, the idea of the multiplicity of channels as a re-
lief for maximum flood conditions is brought forward with
all the complacency that would be manifested if the utter in-
utility of that method was not far within the range of ascer-
tained knowledge.

Engineer' 's Testimony.

James B. Eads, the distinguished hydraulic engineer, who

—28

was brought to this State by the commissioners appointed
under the Act of April 23, 1880, in an able and exhaustive re-
port declared that the multiplication of channels reduced the
drainage capacity of a stream. He showed that the divi-
sion of the channel of a stream augmented the friction which
resists a current, whereas confining the stream to a single ade-
quate channel induced the formation of a hydraulic prism,
which is the form insuring the maximum of flow with the
minmium of friction.

The revival of past theories is accompanied by a proposi-
tion to construct what was known as the Montezuma canal.
This means a canal from Greys Bend, above the mouth of
Feather River on the Sacramento, through the Yolo-Solano
Tule Basin and through a canal cut through the Monte-
zuma Hills into Suisun Bay. This proposition underwent
the most rigid engineering inquiry at the expense of the State
and at the hands of Engineer Smith, whose experience as a
hydraulic engineer was acquired in the service of the British
Government in India when the national irrigation systems of
that country were constructed. His report condemned the
scheme as wholly impracticable. While the reasons for this
conclusion were retained in the popular mind, the Monte-
zuma canal was deemed an impossibility. Its specter rises
as the invaluable literature relating to it is forgotten.

The propositions now brought forward are prompted by
the most public-spirited and patriotic motives. From the
standard of motive, they are worthy of the highest commen-
dation. They are not amenable to the charge of having been
mooted by individuals or any class of individuals, or pro-
—29

moted by any special class of property owners, but they vio-
late the maxim that the present must be a continuation of the
settled principles and ascertained knowledge of the past if it
is to have profitable continuity with the future. In the evo-
lution of the policy of reclamation there is in existence a
copious literature. In 1874, acting under the instruction of
the government and in pursuance of joint resolution of Con-
gress, the government engineers made a hydrographic survey
of the State of California. This survey was conducted by
Colonel Alexander, under whose immediate direction the data
was compiled and the invaluable maps drawn. The report
treated the whole subject of irrigation, reclamation and drain-
age. Its salient recommendation was the construction of a
canal skirting the foothills between the mountains and the
level land of the interior basin and the transfusion and
equalization of the flow of all the affluents of the San Joaquin
and Sacramento valleys.

The report of Engineer Smith with accompanying maps on
the Montezuma Hills canal ; the report of James B. Eads,
special consulting engineer on the drainage of the Sacramento
valley; the various reports of State Engineer William Ham-
mond Hall and his assistant, C. E. Grunsky — these with the
reports of the State swamp land commissions at various times
have cost the State in the aggregate nearly $500,000. It
is a sad commentary on the method in which these costly in-
strumentalities of popular education have been preserved that
their irrefragable conclusions are no longer a guide to public
opinion.

—30

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