Bob admitted that electricity and irrigation are good things.

“These advantages have drawn people.  I am not going to bore you with a lot of statistics, but the population of all White Oaks County, for instance, is now above fifty thousand people, where before was a scant ten.  But how much agricultural wealth do you suppose these people export each year?  Not how much they produce, but their net exportations?”

“Give it up.”

“Fifty million dollars worth!  That’s a marvellous per capita.”

“It is indeed,” said Bob.

“Now,” said Oldham impressively, “that wealth would be absolutely non-existent, that development could not have taken place, did not take place, until men of Mr. Baker’s genius and courage came along to take hold.  I have personally the greatest admiration for Mr. Baker as a type of citizen without whom our resources and possibilities would be in the same backward condition as obtains in Canada.”

“I’m with you there,” said Bob.

“Mr. Baker has added a community to the state, cities to the commonwealth, millions upon millions of dollars to the nation’s wealth.  He took long chances, and he won out.  Do not you think in return the national resources should in a measure reward him for the advantages he has conferred and the immense wealth he has developed?  Mind you, Mr. Baker has merely taken advantage of the strict letter of the law.  It is merely open to another interpretation.  He needs this particular body of timber for the furtherance of one of his greatest quasi-public enterprises; and who has a better right in the distribution of the public domain than the man who uses it to develop the country?  The public land has always been intended for the development of resources, and has always been used as such.”

Oldham talked fluently and well.  He argued at length along the lines set forth above.

“You have to use lubricating oil to overcome friction on a machine,” he concluded.  “You have to subsidize a railroad by land grants to enter a new country.  By the same immutable law you must offer extraordinary inducements to extraordinary men.  Otherwise they will not take the risks.”

“I’ve nothing to do with the letter of the law,” Bob replied; “only with its spirit and intention.  The main idea of the mineral act is to give legitimate miners the timber they need for legitimate mining.  Baker does not pretend, except officially, that he ever intends to do anything with his claims.  He certainly has done a great work for the country.  I’ll agree to everything you say there.  But he came into California worth nothing, and he is now reputed to be worth ten millions and to control vast properties.  That would seem to be reward enough for almost anybody.  He does not need this Basin property for any of his power projects, except that its possession would let him off from paying a very reasonable tax on the waterpower he has been accustomed to getting free.  Cutting that timber will not develop the country any further.  I don’t see the value of your argument in the present case.”